Kuma would shine at any time of the year

Mid-August is a hopeless time for films; so hopeless, useless and bleak, if I don’t use three words when one would have done, I am just never going to fill up this space. The assumption is people don’t wish to visit the cinema on summer evenings, or they are on holiday (I wish!), so the studios put out all their rubbish. This week sees the opening of Bachelorette (a Bridesmaids rip-off), Planes (a Disney film, originally intended for DVD only) and The Lone Ranger, which is said to be so lousy, terrible and awful the producer is going to be hung from a lamppost on Sunset Boulevard, as a warning to all other Hollywood producers. However, on a happier note, which is also cheerier and merrier, there is always the occasional foreign-language gem, twinkling all the brighter, and so we have Kuma.

Kuma is an Austrian-Turkish project, which, at its most basic level, is one of those films that offers a fascinating glimpse into the everyday lives of those of whom we have little or no knowledge. Separation did this with Iranian daily life, and Wajda did this with Saudi Arabian daily life, and if you are as interested as I am in what such people eat for breakfast, or what’s available in the local grocery store, or how the women behave in private, once they are no longer so constrained, you will be with it from the start, as I was. But it’s not just that. It also tells a supremely clever and involving story. Which is also moving. (Nearly left it at two words there, when three could have done! I’m losing my touch!)