She Came to Me

As if the encounter between an opera composer in a creative crisis and an exuberant tugboat captain with a penchant for love stories was not enough for an eccentric plot, Rebecca Miller throws an obsessively tidy psychiatrist in the throes of a religious episode and an ultra-conservative court stenographer-cum-self-appointed-prosecutor with a thing for historical re-enactments into the mix of her sixth feature film as writer and director. Bringing balance and sense to these adults riddled with neuroses, obsessions and prejudices are two teenagers who are in love and more aware, more lucid and wiser than all those around them. Thanks to the surprising alchemy of an impeccable cast, Miller is able to interweave destinies and coincidences, arranging her characters as if they were a whimsical score for a sophisticated comedy or troubled romance. Here is a Romeo and Juliet, set against the backdrop of a divided America, in the key of a folk ballad which, refracted through an operatic setting, casts its own narrative into elaborate perspective. For anyone who, like Captain Katrina, has been advised to abstain from romantic films, She Came to Me offers a great opportunity to renew their addiction. (Berlinale)