Waters of Dissatisfaction
Edgar Aldape Morales
Anchor and Hope
As if it were an extension of their lives, the London canal on which Kat and Eva travel in their picturesque houseboat seems to change as their romance does. At the beginning, their happiness is prototypical: laughter, walks, and loving gazes, apparently sincere and indestructible. But just as the floodgates of a lock may close, the love between them enters into a spiral whose tipping point is the formula Barcelona director Carlos Marqués-Marcet explores in ANCHOR AND HOPE (2017): two women in love who want to have a child.
Kat and Eva view the arrival of Roger, the sperm donor, as an opportunity for their love to grow. The relationship of the three is treated simply, in keeping with the aim of the film: to present an appealing story. The Catalan director handles his actors in an easygoing style, which translates the freedom offered by the waters of the canal. Nevertheless, the story fails to clarify its premise: the dissatisfaction of our time, in which its ever more difficult for the younger generation to anchor the hope alluded to in the title. On the contrary, the treatment is disappointing, from the rustic esthetic to the prototypical roleplay of both the lesbian couple and of the worried donor. Nevertheless, the interaction of the characters and the dialogue ―which may even have been improvised― demonstrate Marqués-Marcet’s ability to create stories that generate empathy, necessary at times in the turbulent circumstances of the present.
