TL;DR – A fun little story about finding love in a faraway land, where you might find yourself for than anything else.    

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service that viewed this film

Faraway Review –

Sometimes you sit down to watch a film with no real plan as to what you will watch. You are just looking for something to spark your interest, and the story of a woman finding love in a long-lost house bequeathed to her by her late mother, who no one knew about. That is a good plot hook to make me interested in how that plays out.

So to set the scene, Zeynep Altin (Naomi Krauss) is trying to keep the family together as they prepare for her mother’s funeral. But things are not good at home, as just about every member of her house walks all over her. But it is at this lowest point when the family lawyer tells Zeynep that her mother purchased a home in her homeland of Croatia and left it to Zeynep in her will. What do you do when everyone has let you down? Well, how about you head to the coast and find a new view on life?  

I do have to say that nearly everyone in this film starts off being incredibly unlikable. Zey comes into this town like a whirlwind without considering anyone else but herself. Her mother is Croatian, but she knows nothing of the people and place, and this is a legitimate critique of what she is doing. But also one of Josip’s (Goran Bogdan) first things he does is critique what she eats and how she looks, and rocks in glass houses, my dude. It does not help that the film takes a long time to resolve the tension with her husband, Ilyas Altin (Adnan Maral), when that outcome was a foregone conclusion from the start of the film. But while these things could have sunk the film, it instead finds its feet.  

Where Faraway works well is when it explores the multifaceted world that forged Zey. A Turkish father, and a Croatian mother, while being raised in Germany. She doesn’t speak Croatian, and Josip doesn’t speak German, so they come together in English with all the pitfalls of it being a second language. You have Zey finding herself in multiple ways, which is the story’s heart, which is good because it is the most compelling part. Discovering who you are is difficult at any age, but taking a second stab at life when you think it has already come to a conclusion point makes for a powerful story.

The film does have an issue with the tone jumping all over the place from farcical to sincere and back again. But, like, it works, it shouldn’t, but it does. The cast helps sell this because they throw themselves into this movie. It also helps that the entire film is set in a part of the world [Šolta, Croatia] that is simply stunning. There is no view that does not take your breath away. It works because you think anyone would have a life-altering experience looking out from that cliff. [SPOLIERS] I am also glad it only dabbles in a love-triangle rather than being all about it.

In the end, do we recommend Faraway? Well, there is not much substance here, but I don’t think it needed it. When it was firing on all cylinders, it was a bunch of fun, silly fun, but still fun. If you liked Faraway, I would recommend to you Falling Inn Love.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

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Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Faraway
Directed by – Vanessa Jopp
Story by – Alex Kendall
Screenplay by – Jane Ainscough
Music by – Annette Tocks
Cinematography by – Katharina Bühler
Edited by – Brigitta Tauchner
Production/Distribution Companies – Olga Film, Pakt Media & Netflix
Starring – Naomi Krauss, Goran Bogdan, Adnan Maral, Bahar Balci, Vedat Erincin, Artjom Gilz, Davor Tomić, Mladen Vasari, Paula Schramm, Christian Schneller, Butz Ulrich Buse & Ivan Zadro      
Rating – Australia: M;