08/11/2022 - Social satire meets sex comedy – and a whole lot of dairy – in Milcho Manchevski’s confusing latest

Milcho Manchevski’s new film Kaymak [+see also:
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film profile] – fresh off its world premiere at the Tokyo International Film Festival – is a bit of a shocker, and not an entirely pleasant one. It’s broad, it’s vulgar, and it’s so ridiculous at times that you can’t help but chuckle. But the Macedonian director doesn’t fully commit to the crazy, injecting the story with sad exchanges or comments on the hierarchy between the privileged and the unprivileged. And the contrast is jarring.

Any attempts at satire – and there are many – come undone because of the film’s jaw-dropping lack of subtlety. Various sexual acts are mostly played for laughs, unless wearing a diving mask in bed is already a well-established practice. There is an odd subplot involving an intellectually challenged character-turned-surrogate, and statements like: “I will stuff you like a stuffed cabbage.”

Which, frankly, makes it extremely hard to care later on, even though there is a lot of disappointment and pain in this one building in Skopje. A wealthy couple (Filip Trajkovikj and Kamka Tocinovski, stuck in the part of a successful professional longing to be a mother, which feels very old-fashioned) can’t have a child. Another marriage (embodied by Aleksander Mikic and Simona Spirovska) is on the rocks: partly, it seems, because the wife keeps bringing home meat pies, day in and day out. Without uttering a single word to each other – unless you count one whisper of “May your cunt dry up” – these neighbours are soon trying out different configurations in their respective households. Everyone is happy, until they are not. Which is probably the single most realistic part of this movie.

Perhaps Manchevski, still being chased by the ghost of his phenomenally successful debut, Before the Rain, just wanted to entertain himself a little. But the story he is trying to tell makes little sense, and the constant zigzagging between serious drama and pure silliness induces dizziness. Also, if social commentary is really the way to go, why the slo-mo sequences of new ménages à trois strutting their stuff like it’s a Sergio Leone movie?

Kaymak – named after a delicious dairy treat that apparently leads to infidelity, or worse – is undeniably confusing, but its approach to sex on screen could at least raise some interesting questions. That’s a bigger societal problem, not just Manchevski’s: people get scared by it, reducing it to dumb comedy or tragic tales where following one’s desire leads to a whole lot of tears. But there is hope for the future, one feels, as the youngest character here doesn’t even bat an eyelid whenever carnality is discussed, bemoaning the commitment of Utah’s promise ring-wearing teens on Skype. Until then, brace yourself for that diving mask.

Kaymak is a Macedonian-Danish-Dutch-Croatian production staged by Banana Film and Scala Productions, and co-produced by Meta Film, N279 Entertainment, Jaako Dobra Produkcija and Dare Films. Its sales are overseen by LevelK.