Portuguese director Miguel Gomez has produced a strangely fascinating travelogue which wanders through Asia with the barest suggestion of a story.
Edward Abbot (Goncalo Waddington) is a handsome British colonial official stationed in the Burmese city of Rangoon in 1917. He is engaged to Molly (Crista Alfaiate) but has not seen her for seven years.
As the film begins he is waiting with a bouquet of flowers for her ship to arrive. He starts having second thoughts and suddenly he is giving away the flowers and stowing away on a ship to Singapore.
There he meets Molly’s shady brother in the Raffles hotel, and then he meanders aimlessly through Bangkok, Saigon, Manila, Osaka and into China.
When Molly arrives she sets off in hot pursuit.
The film, shot mainly in black and white, is an intriguing blend of magical realism, documentary and social commentary, reflecting on the colonial lifestyle and its clash with Asian culture.
Gomez mixes historic footage of life in 1917 Burma with contemporary scenes shot in 1920, before he had even completed the script.
We see elaborate marionette performances and shadow puppets, carnivals and karaoke, and a modern fishing boat sailing from Bangkok to Saigon at twilight.
One scene, filmed in colour, has three men at a showground in modern Myanmar, laboriously turning a motorless Ferris wheel by hand. Another has tuk tuks and motor scooters weaving through traffic to the music of Strauss’s Blue Danube.
Now and then we glimpse Edward or Molly as they travel separately and often at random through what feels like a mystical dream.
Gomes won a Best Director award at Cannes, where he described the imagery of Grand Tour as evoking the spectacle of the world.
* Grand Tour recently showed at UWA’s Somerville; look out for other opportunities to see it.
Watch the trailer…
