a verbose summary
André Téchiné’s Film “Loin” contains, not necessarily in this order,
Tanger, truck drivers who transport goods from Morocco to Europe across the sea, truck drivers who smuggle drugs from Morocco to Europe across the sea, truck drivers in or under whose trucks people wanting to enter Europe hide and are most often found, competent, efficient, and nice transport company employees, a young Moroccan woman who runs a small pension in Tanger and feels drawn to a young French truck driver, young acrobats, a dead mother, a few Nigerians who rent rooms in the small pension run by the young Moroccan woman, Montreal, a young French truck driver who is drawn to the young Moroccan woman who runs a small pension in Tanger, policemen, a young Moroccan man who works in the small pension run by the young Moroccan woman and who wants to enter Europe hiding in or under a truck, a mountainbike, an aged and gay US expatriate who likes his drink and whose monologue apparently consists of hidden Paul Bowles quotes, a young and gay French filmmaker who takes a liking to the young Moroccan who works in the small pension run by the young Moroccan woman, Jean Renoir’s film “the river”, customs officials, a coastline from which you can see Spain, many people who look at Spain, Moroccan drug traffickers, a dead boy, another dead boy, erotic women’s underwear, an absent brother, a middle-aged pregnant Moroccan woman, and a fucked-up car.
Some of these things are discreetly superfluous, some of them outrageously superfluous, but what the heck. It’s a film worth watching.