Directing: B-
Acting: B+
Writing: C+
Cinematography: B
Editing: B-

I have kind of a thing for movies about older married couples who have been together for decades. Life isn’t all young love, you know—nor is it even all about new love (though I do also enjoy movies about older people who find love). I’m fully aware that the average moviegoer isn’t exactly demanding stories like this, and my being on the precipice of 50 years old is probably a factor here. So what? If any of you young whippersnappers don’t care about this then go read some other movie review!

Well, here’s the thing. Midwinter Break is still, unfortunately, kind of forgettable. We could start with the title itself. I saw the trailer to this movie several times, and still I often struggled to remember the name of it. Midwinter Break sounds like an off-brand version of the Vacation franchise, except trust me, nothing outrageous happens here.

What does happen is some very good acting. Ciarán Hinds and especially Lesley Manville effortlessly elevate what is otherwise pretty milquetoast material, about an older couple whose one child has long since moved out, they are set adrift in their lives together, and the absence of other family puts their conflicting spiritual beliefs into sharper relief. Stella buys tickets to Amsterdam as a Christmas present to Gerry, and they mean to go on an adventure together. You know, in midwinter.

I was very interested in the location shooting in Amsterdam, as I will be visiting there for the first time this summer (not in winter, thankfully). We do get several shots of Stella and Gerry walking along the canals, and one brief sequence of them walking through the Anne Frank House, which winds up becoming a relevant detail in one of their later conflicts about their respective approaches to religion. I’m not sure it’s the best reflection of the narrative onscreen that I found myself thinking, oh right: I definitely need to book timed tickets to the Anne Frank House before we get there.

To call Midwinter Break “meditative” would be an understatement. It’s filled with quiet, contemplative scenes. Early on, we just settle into Stella and Gerry’s quiet routine together, the comfortable way they coexist, though we see very quickly how Stella feels alienated and Gerry is a bit oblivious. She goes to Christmas mass without him, and she’s very devout; Gerry, for his part, basically puts up with her piousness, though he does also scoff a bit, something that naturally comes up later.

It’s not that I didn’t find Midwinter Break compelling, though I do think that with other actors it would really have been a drag. Plenty of viewers will likely find this a drag regardless. But director Polly Findlay gradually builds up the idea of a secret that Stella is living with, and it has to do with when she was once caught in crossfire during a siege in Belfast when she was pregnant. Eventually Stella delivers a long monologue about it to an expatriate fellow Irishwoman she’s met in Amsterdam, and Manville’s delivery, as always, is impeccable, even moving. Nevertheless, once the reveal we’ve been waiting for occurs, it’s hard not to think: that’s it?

Ultimately Midwinter Break is about the beginning of a long-term marriage unraveling, due to religious incompatibility, basically. Stella uses the word “spiritual,” but I would argue it’s more religious—the taking of comfort through religious ritual. It ends on a very subtly hopeful note, after an emotional exchange at the Amsterdam airport while they wait for their delayed flight in a snow storm—I do rather wish we could have seen more of the city to give this relatively drab story some more environmental character. Ultimately, Midwinter Break isn’t for everyone, but some, like me, might at the very least be moved by the performances.

*This is a vacation we’re bound to forget.*

Overall: B-