xenia movie review

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Xenia Reviews

What Xenia captures (successfully, repeatedly) is that uncomfortable late teen age, where you're grasping desperately for your childhood and its safe comforts, and also itching to become new, independent, and powerful.

Full Review | Aug 21, 2017

Koutras admirably resists easy wish fulfillment by making the brothers' journey more important than their destination, but the scenario he presents inexplicably turns out to be fantasy.

Full Review | Nov 5, 2015

You come away from "Xenia" feeling a bit more alive and ready to throw caution to the wind.

Full Review | Oct 11, 2015

Though the story's finally too predictable and a little too thin to captivate for the film's entire two-hours-plus running time, the characters, their chemistry and their plight are compelling

Full Review | Oct 7, 2015

The plot frequently strays, but Nikouli and Gelia keep us focused on the growing, endearing fraternal bond between their characters.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 7, 2015

Brashly uneven and wildly overlong, this comedy of brotherly love and outsider acceptance nonetheless boasts a spirited, audience-pleasing core.

Pleasingly elliptical in the way it confronts Greece's concurrent crises of economic decline and ascendant militancy.

Full Review | Oct 6, 2015

It leaves room for a few flights of fancy where the lack of verisimilitude feels less like screenplay filler and more like unabashed poetic license.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Oct 5, 2015

The reality that the movie portrays is deeper than this bad caricature. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Sep 23, 2015

A post-modern drama, filled with radical ideas of rebellion and a lot of joy and fun to go along with it. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Sep 17, 2015

A delicious road movie about the unbreakable love between two brothers. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 9, 2015

The drama, comedy, and musical numbers don't mix evenly, and the movie drags for too long. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Sep 7, 2015

An extravagant and fun work that shows a very different Greece at the one described in text books or the one we see in the news. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Sep 3, 2015

The director makes great use of its locations and a great sense of humor to talk about delicate subjects like the migration situation and the lack of hospitality in modern day Greece. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Sep 3, 2015

• Cast & crew
• User reviews

Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away. Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away. Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away.

• Panos H. Koutras
• Panagiotis Evangelidis
• Frédérique Moreau
• Kostas Nikouli
• Nikos Gelia
• Giannis Stankoglou
• 9 User reviews
• 56 Critic reviews
• 62 Metascore
• 10 wins & 14 nominations

Top cast 99+

• Maria-Sonia

• Patty Pravo

• Police Officer

• Singer on Yaught
• Odysseas' Roommate

• Greek Star Presenter
• (as Mihalis-Angelos Jeya)
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Did you know

• Trivia Among the CD that Odysseas (Ody) is searching in the closet at the rooftop are Stereo Nova - Discolata (1993) and Trypes - Mesa Sth Nyxta ton Allon (1999).
• Connections References Sailor Moon (1995)
• Soundtracks Bambola Performed by Patty Pravo Lyrics by Franco Migliacci Composed by Bruno Zambrini & Ruggero Cini © 1968 SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT (Italy) S.p.A.

User reviews 9

• Kirpianuscus
• May 21, 2021
• How long is Xenia? Powered by Alexa
• June 18, 2014 (France)
• Cuestión de actitud
• Kozani, Greece (abandoned Xenia hotel)
• 100% Synthetic Films
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• €1,500 (estimated)
• Oct 11, 2015

Technical specs

• Runtime 2 hours 14 minutes
• Dolby Digital

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Review: xenia.

It leaves room for a few flights of fancy where the lack of verisimilitude feels less like screenplay filler and more like unabashed poetic license.

Danny (Kostas Nikouli) is a lollipop-sucking 16-year-old twink out of a Gregg Araki film or an old XY magazine cover. His brother, Ody (Nikos Gelia), is an unsmilingly butch 18-year-old sandwich-shop worker with a buzzkilling attitude and no particularly cinematic look. In the wake of their mother’s death, the siblings, Greeks of Albanian origin, seek to find their estranged father, hoping the man who left when they were still babies, and who they call “The Nameless,” will give them money and the citizenship they need so as not to be deported. Such is the premise of Xenia , a campy road movie in which brotherhood is inevitably an erotic affair, and Greece is an unbearable netherworld, teeming with fascist vigilantes who chastise foreigners for not speaking Greek and punch them while yelling, “Kill the Arabs!”

Filmmaker Panos H. Koutras is most interested in the twists and turns of the narrative and its various implausible events, too often accompanied by the kind of generic piano music that could flatten even the deepest images. Thankfully, he also leaves room for a few flights of fancy where the lack of verisimilitude feels less like screenplay filler and more like unabashed poetic license, uncommitted to plot. As in Danny’s pet rabbit going from being alive to becoming a stuffed animal, only to return as a larger-than-life Lynchian bunny. Or Danny and Ody dancing naked, lingering in their embrace. Or the dreamlike relationship Danny nurtures with Italian diva Patty Pravo, which echoes that of little Ludovic’s and his favorite doll in My Life in Pink , a surreal mixture of role model, divine force, and ghostly alibi. Danny’s fascination with Pravo—who even makes a cameo—is Xenia ’s most permeating motif, her songs turning up to punctuate the film as the brothers break out in song and dance.

Xenia could be described as a gay film, with its diva songs, impromptu choreography, bleached bangs on hairless boys, and general tendency toward extravagance. There’s also something decisively Greek about it, with obvious references to harsh economic realities and xenophobia. But Xenia ’s gayness and Greekness feel like cosmetic layers of a much more universal story about mourning. While it’s the mother who literally passes away, it’s the father’s absence that resurfaces as both unendurable pain and utopian promise—of a return. This is the kind of impossible homecoming that, perhaps, informs man’s essence more decisively than sexuality and nation.

Diego Semerene

Diego Semerene is an assistant professor of queer and transgender media at the University of Amsterdam.

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Where to Watch

Kostas Nikouli (Dany) Nikos Gelia (Odysseas) Giannis Stankoglou (Lefteris) Marisha Triantafyllidou (Vivi) Romanna Lobach (Maria-Sonia) Aggelos Papadimitriou (Tasos) Patty Pravo (Patty Pravo) Mohamed Alhanini (Achmat) Ioulios Tziatas (Moustafa) Electra Leda Koutra (Lawyer)

Panos H. Koutras

Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away.

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Directed by Panos H. Koutras

A new Greek odyssey

Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away.

Kostas Nikouli Nikos Gelia Yannis Stankoglou Marissa Triantafyllidou Aggelos Papadimitriou Romanna Lobats Patty Pravo Menelas Mihalis-Angelos Jeya Polydoros Vogiatzis Giorgos Vouvakis Romanna Lobach Zacharias Mavroeidis

Director Director

Panos H. Koutras

Producers Producers

Eleni Kossyfidou Alexandra Boussiou Panos H. Koutras

Writers Writers

Panagiotis Evangelidis Panos H. Koutras

Casting Casting

Elias Moustakis Christina Akzoti Maria Laina Alex Kelly

Editor Editor

Yorgos Lamprinos

Cinematography Cinematography

Hélène Louvart Simos Sarketzis

Lighting Lighting

Babis Kalderimitzis

Camera Operators Camera Operators

Nikos Pastras Stefanos Kalothetos George Maniatis Panagiotis Vasilakis

Production Design Production Design

Pinelopi Valti

Art Direction Art Direction

Stavros Liokalos

Set Decoration Set Decoration

Daphne Koutra

Composers Composers

Delaney Blue George Boussounis

Sound Sound

Fred Demolder Philippe Charbonnel Olivier Thys

Costume Design Costume Design

Vassilios Barbarigos

Makeup Makeup

Bénédicte Trouvé

Hairstyling Hairstyling

Hronis Tzimos

Eurimages Entre Chien et Loup Greek Film Centre Centre du Cinéma et de l'Audiovisuel de la FWB L'Aide aux Cinémas du Monde 100% Synthetic Films Wrong Men Movie Partners In Motion Film Media ARTE France Cinéma CNC

Belgium France Greece

Primary Language

Greek (modern)

Spoken Languages

Italian Greek (modern) Albanian

Releases by Date

19 may 2014, 10 sep 2014, 25 sep 2014, 06 nov 2014, theatrical limited, 12 oct 2015, 18 jun 2014, 28 aug 2014, 02 oct 2014, 15 jan 2015, 05 jul 2014, 20 mar 2015, 11 apr 2016, releases by country.

• Premiere Toronto International Film Festival
• Digital 12+
• Premiere Cannes Film Festival
• Premiere Athens Film Festival
• Theatrical Κ-15
• Premiere Thessaloniki International Film Festival
• Physical DVD, Blu-ray
• Physical 15 DVD
• Theatrical limited New York

123 mins   More at IMDb TMDb Report this page

Popular reviews

Review by {Todd} ★★★½ 2

"Well, we're strangers everywhere" - Maria, "We're at home everywhere too" - Odysseus,

This isn't really that weird for Greek weird wave but you do get to see a penis, which is of course a national tradition.

In Xenia, two Albanian brothers and their bunny travel across the country of Greece to find their dad, gain Greek citizenship, and compete in a reality singing competition. Along the way the brothers learn about themselves and stuff. I was worried this might be too slow but it's a well paced and reflective film with some nice surprises.

I love how this film mixes grounded realism with strange surrealist parts, especially at night. They play with colors, animal movement, etc and it's really…

Review by Dimitris Dx ★★★½

Ταινία που περιέχει αναφορές στην Ντόροθι του Μάγου του Οζ, το κουνέλι του Ντόνι Ντάρκο, την μουσική της Patty Pravo και τον καλύτερο στίχο που τραγούδησε ποτέ η Άντζελα Δημητρίου, είναι de facto καλή ταινία. Ο Κούτρας έχει τόση φόρα και πάθος που μερικές φορές χάνει τον έλεγχο αλλά, damn, δεν γίνεται να φύγεις χωρίς χαμόγελο στο τέλος της προβολής.

Review by 🌻 lindsay 🌻 ★★★½

I thought this was fun and I love a gay road trip movie!! 

there was a lot that was weird about this movie (rabbits.....) but it was overall way more accessible than most greek weird wave movies that I’ve seen. 

I think it was a bit too long and the ending could have been wrapped up more quickly. But overall I was entertained by this.

Review by dark tyler ★★★★

"ε, κάπως μαλάκας φαινότανε"

τίποτα σε αυτή την ταινία δεν είναι big deal κι αυτό είναι σπουδαίο επειδή τα πάντα σε αυτή την ταινία είναι big deal.

ο κούτρας αντιπαραθέτει το intellectual με το trash και το camp με το cool, με όση φυσικότητα καταφέρνει να αφηγηθεί με νηφαλιότητα, πάθος και λατρεία μια περιθωριακή οδύσσεια στο σκατένιο μας Τώρα κάνοντάς τη να μοιάζει με σκληρό και πολύχρωμο παραμύθι όπου η απόδραση είναι state of mind αλλά οι κακοί λύκοι είναι αληθινοί. το ότι επιμένει να βλέπει αισιόδοξα τους κόσμους που εξερευνά τον κάνει κι αυτόν ένα 16χρονο αγόρι που δε θέλει να μεγαλώσει. ευτυχώς.

Review by reibureibu

There's an article on Xenia that's really brilliant titled The Un-Queering of Queer Cinema: Panos H. Koutras, Xenia (2014) , and if you've seen the film you should definitely give it a read (forewarning: it is long). The general idea is that this is an example of a queer film that's removed from what previous queer films sought to do – a great example of what film looks late late in the New Queer Cinema movement, or perhaps part of a "Nu-New Queer" movement altogether.

It's interesting in how it does this by bringing up Dany's queerness early on and... actually not doing too much with it besides here and there. He's gay and there's some sexual tension that happens, some…

Review by jumanji_wmv

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

dany looks like a randomized Sim

Review by Aldo_Unchained ★★★★½

έλα εντάξει φανταστικό

Review by Elena ★★

Who made the dialogues? They are really putting down the movie....

Review by Daniel Romero 🇲🇽 ★★★

One of the weirdest movies I've seen in a while and not in a good way.

I can't really make my mind of what to think of it because there's so much going on at the same time.

At the very core, it has some moments of brilliance but there's a tremendous lack of focus and that took so much of my enjoyment from it. Despite all flaws, this is a good step forward for the new NEW queer cinema.

Review by atsali ★★★★

Οι σκηνές των παραισθήσεων είναι ανθολογίας, ειδικά η πρώτη στο καράβι με την Patty Pravo να λέει στον Dany να φορέσει ζακέτα!!!

Review by Krautsalat ★★★★

Fluffy animals and hunky boys. This is what I'd imagine Mary Crawford's remake of Harvey would be like.

Review by Michael Scott ★★★

Expectation at film festivals can be a hard master. So many film, so many glowing write-ups in the festival guide. MQFF is a little different. Festival circuit queer film at the moment is in a bit of a sorry state now that distributors are more willing to pick up top tier queer fare for general release (look at Love is Strange and Eastern Boys currently on release). There are always, of course, the chance that quality cinema will be too niche to miss out on a distribution deal and that the fest will be the only chance to catch it (this year's preeminent candidates are Stand and The Circle ). That's what keeps me coming back.

This year, Xenia was my…

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‘xenia’: cannes review.

Greek director Panos Koutras sends two Greek-Albanian brothers, played by Kostas Nikouli and Nikos Gelia, on a pan-Hellenic trip in search of their father.

By Boyd van Hoeij

Boyd van Hoeij

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Xenia Cannes Film Still - H 2014

CANNES — After the death of their Albanian mother, two teenage brothers go in search of their Greek father in Xenia , the latest feature of brash-and-bold Hellenic director Panos H. Koutras ( The Attack of the Giant Mousaka, A Woman’s Way ).

With the younger of the two siblings a flamboyant 15-year-old gay boy; his broad-shouldered brother, three years his senior, a potential candidate for a Greek  Idol -like singing contest and with more bunny-driven surrealism than Donnie Darko , there’s a decidedly campy side to the proceedings that Koutras effectively juxtaposes with the hard-edged realities of contemporary Greece, a beautiful but hostile nation wrecked by the ongoing economic crisis and a place in which xenophobia, racism and homophobia seem to fester freely.

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Though the story’s finally too predictable and a little too thin to captivate for the film’s entire two-hours-plus running time, the characters, their chemistry and their plight are compelling, which should ensure a healthy festival life for this Un Certain Regard selection, as well as niche theatrical opportunities, especially for youth- and queer-oriented distributors.

CANNES REVIEW: Force Majeure (Turist)

15-year-old Dany ( Kostas Nikouli ), with an asymmetrical, bottle-blond haircut and funky clothes, is first seen with a lollipop in his mouth while an older man is about to go down on him, before Dany pumps him for some dough. The startling opening telegraphs what viewers need to know about Daniel, who’s comfortable with being gay but also slightly lost, trying to pretend he’s fine by doing things he’s seen older people do but doesn’t necessarily understand. The character’s clichés — the hair and attire, the default wisecracking/catty demeanor — clearly come from the adolescent’s need to find a workable personality, which he’s obviously piecing together from used parts. As if to prove the point, Koutras never uses Dany’s lollipop in a suggestive way but, on the contrary, makes it a marker of the kid’s child-like sweet tooth.

With a white pet rabbit he takes everywhere, the daydreaming Dany leaves Crete for Athens to find his older brother, Odysseus or Ody ( Nikos Gelia ), so he can tell him in person their mother has died. Together, they travel to Thessaloniki, where their Greek father, who walked out on them ages ago, supposedly lives, hoping they can get his nationality — a necessity if they want to stay in Greece — and a share of his rumored wealth.

Along the way, Ody manages to do some singing, including several songs by the siblings’ idol, camp Italian chanteuse Patty Pravo , and Dany gets the boys into trouble when playing with a gun. If many of the story beats of Koutras and regular co-screenwriter Panagiotis Evangelidis ’s screenplay are familiar, what makes the material fresh is its constant juxtaposition of realism and an at-times surreal fantasy world into which especially Dany occasionally retreats — though were singing and dancing are concerned, Ody is just as game as his little brother.

CANNES REVIEW: Amour Fou

The title is significant, as Xenia, which can be translated as “hospitality,” refers to both the ancient Greek custom that the current debate over immigrants in Greece (such as these half-Albanian kids) willfully ignores, as well as a hotel chain that’s gone bust and that provides the siblings with an abandoned, half-ruined building to sleep in on their no-budget journey to find their father — a potent visual metaphor for the state of hospitality in a divided country in tatters.

Though very affable, Gelia can’t quite overcome the contradiction written into the DNA of Ody, who’s both a tough guy and improbably in love with the songs of a 1960s diva. As his kid brother, Nikouli, also a newcomer, is a revelation as Dany, a kid who’s a loveable, confused but well-meaning disaster area, and the couple’s colorful back-and-forths are one of the film’s chief pleasures.

Technically, the film looks and sounds fine despite a checkered production history.

In Cannes Film Festival (Un Certain Regard)

Production companies: 100% Synthetic Films, Wrong Men, MPM Film, Entre Chien et Loup, Arte France Cinema

Cast: Kostas Nikouli, Nikos Gelia, Aggelos Papadimitriou, Romanna Lobach, Marissa Triandayllidou, Yannis Stankoglou

Director: Panos H. Koutras

Screenwriters: Panos H. Koutras, Panagiotis Evangelidis

Producers: Eleni Kossyfidou, Panos H. Koutras, Alexandra Boussiou

Director of photography: Helene Louvart, Simon Sarketzis

Production designer: Pinelopi Valti

Music: Delaney Blue

Costume designer: Vassilis Barbarigos

Editor: Yorgos Lamprinos

No rating, 128 minutes.

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by  Panos H. Koutras

After the death of their mother, Dany, 16, leaves Crete to join his older brother, Odysseas, who lives in Athens. Born from an Albanian mother and a Greek father they never met, the two brothers, strangers in their own country, decide to go to Thessaloniki to look for their father and force him to officially recognize them. At the same time in Thessaloniki, is held the selection for the cult show, “Greek Star.” Dany dreams that his brother Odysseas, a gifted singer, could become the new star of the contest, in a country that refuses to accept them.

more about: Xenia

Xenia : Identity and brotherhood

CANNES 2014: In the Un Certain Regard section, Panos H Koutras presents a realistic and extremely charming fable about two brothers of Albanian heritage in today’s Greece   

19/05/2014 | Cannes 2014 | Un Certain Regard/Greece

Interview: Panos H. Koutras • Director

“The energy of adolescence”

CANNES 2014: Cineuropa met up with Greek director Panos H Koutras to talk about Xenia , popular in the Certain Regard section of the 67th Cannes Film Festival   

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Entertainment | Cannes Film Review: ‘Xenia’

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Entertainment.

follows a gay Cretan teen and his golden-voiced older brother as they seek their future (and their estranged father) in Greece.

Brashly uneven and wildly overlong, this comedy of brotherly love and outsider acceptance nonetheless boasts a spirited, audience-pleasing core; with some strict cutting, “Xenia” should find numerous festivals and queer-friendly distributors more than hospitable.

Warmly received by Cannes crowds following its premiere in the Un Certain Regard strand

where frisky light relief is generally a rare commodity

“Xenia” represents a sparkier side of its national cinema to the more severe output of the so-called Greek new wave, much favored by international festival programmers in recent years. Which is not to say the pic isn’t subversive in its own daffy way: In a country where economic downturn, as in much of the European Union, has assisted the rise of far-right politics, Koutras’ forthright celebration of homosexuality, advocation of immigrant rights and rejection of patriarchy collectively make a neon-bright statement. It is perhaps that sense of social import that has emboldened this otherwise slight work into a testing two-hour-plus running time; Koutras’ comedy would be no less pointed, and more consistently funny, at 90 minutes.

The proceedings open in cheerfully in-your-face fashion, with 15-year-old Dany (confident newcomer Kostas Nikouli) being orally pleasured by a significantly older man

an act that raises less concern in itself than the boy’s affectedly disaffected response to it. Flamboyantly styled, complete with pierced septum and bleached boy-band haircut, Dany wears his sexuality very much on his sleeve

or he would, if his distressed denim vest had sleeves in the first place. That makes him heedlessly vulnerable to bullying and exploitation, all the more so in the immediate wake of his Albanian mother’s death. With only his pet bunny Dido for company, Dany makes the decision to leave Crete for Athens, where his older brother Odysseas (model-handsome Nikos Gelia) has made a modest life for himself.

The brothers’ residential situation in Greece is legally tenuous, though Dany has a plan. Together, they’ll journey to Thessaloniki to reunite with the allegedly wealthy Greek father who abandoned them as tots, while Odysseas, a gifted aspiring singer, can audition for a popular television talent show along the lines of “American Idol.” It’s a slender road-movie premise, its drama sporadically heightened by Dany’s ill-advised decision to pack a gun. The resulting farce is often shrill and overextended, but it’s the conflicted, mutually protective fraternal bond at the narrative’s center that keeps things emotionally engaging, even as the outcome of their attempted family reunion seems obvious from the outset.

Aided by the punchy color palette of the production and costume design, splashily showcased in the vibrant lensing of French d.p. Helene Louvart (also the eyes behind Alice Rohrwacher’s Cannes competish entry “The Wonders”), Koutras articulates Dany’s mental instability with a vivid fantasy life. His flights of fancy range from the “Donnie Darko”-style inflation of Dido into a cottontail of colossal proportions to one remarkable image of the grass beneath him morphing into a vast, whorl-haired man’s torso. The film finds equally arresting imagery in the real world, however: The abandoned concrete shell of a hotel (graced with the rusted logo of Greece’s Xenia hospitality chain) that shelters the brothers for a time is poignantly typical of the infrastructural scars left on the landscape by financial crisis.

As is the director’s usual preference, the ensemble mixes established character actors with non-professional discoveries – principally, the two young leads, found via a year-long casting and rehearsal process. Both actors hold the screen with disarming ease; any false or overplayed notes in either performance could be addressed in a more disciplined edit. As befits the character of Dany, Nikouli is the more abrasively charismatic presence, endearing and exasperating in equal measure. The burlier, lower-key Gelia supports him with the right balance of tacit tenderness and jocular aggro.

2014 Variety Media, LLC, a subsidiary of Penske Business Media; Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

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Review: Teen road trip in Greek ‘Xenia’ wanders down odd paths

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At the beginning of “Xenia,” the new Greek road-trip feature from director and co-writer Panos H. Koutras, 15-year-old Dany interrupts the sexual overtures of an older man to care for his bunny and to ask for a cash advance for the trip from Crete to Athens.

Upon his arrival in Athens, Dany (Kostas Nikouli) informs his 17-year-old brother, Ody (Nikos Gelia), that their Albanian immigrant mother has died.

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The siblings decide to journey to Thessaloniki. There they will hit up their estranged father, whom they call the Unspeakable, to seek long-overdue child support and legal status to prevent deportation. Ody also will honor their mother’s dying wish by answering a cattle call for the TV talent competition “Greek Star” and covering a tune by beloved Italian diva Patty Pravo.

Dany, meanwhile, perpetually sports a skimpy tank top, ripped shorts, a studded choker and a girlish asymmetrical long blond side bang, making him a target for xenophobes and homophobes alike. A walking contradiction of childish and melodramatic impulses, he packs his duffel bag with a handgun and his bunny Dido.

The film feels gratuitous and exploitative at times as it skirts dangerously close to child sex and incest. Koutras admirably resists easy wish fulfillment by making the brothers’ journey more important than their destination, but the scenario he presents inexplicably turns out to be fantasy.

------------

MPAA rating: None

Running time: 2 hours, 8 minutes.

Playing: Sundance Sunset, Los Angeles.

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Xenia Reviews

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For some reason, the enigmatic Xenia (Themis Bazaka) feels she must give birth to her child in the mountainous country of Andalusia in Southern Spain. As she travels to her rendezvous with birth, she hooks up with a young actor (Denis Podalides) on his way to an audition there. His car has broken down, and he has accepted a ride from her. The two converse about life, art, the light in the Mediterranean, etc. As they travel, Xenia begins to feel the first pangs of birth, and the young man learns how to care for another person.

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Loving Adults Ending, Explained: What Happened to Xenia’s Body?

Netflix’s ‘ Loving Adults ’ follows the story of Leonora and Christian, who find themselves caught in a loveless marriage that they can’t get out of. It starts as an extramarital affair but things take a bloody turn when a murder happens. What follows is a series of events that result in Leonora and Christian’s relationship becoming all the more twisted and dark. By the time the story ends, their marriage becomes so convoluted that one can’t help but wonder why they couldn’t have figured out something simpler for themselves. The ending packs a punch and it looks like maybe, Christian and Leonora were really meant for each other. Here we analyze what the ending really means for them. SPOILERS AHEAD

Loving Adults Plot Synopsis

Leonora was a gifted violinist. Her career looked bright, but she had put that success on hold when her son got really sick. Someone needed to stay at home and take care of him while her husband, Christian, went out to make money. So, Leonora gave away her career, everything that she’d worked for her entire life. At least, she had a happy family. But that changes when she discovers that while their son was fighting cancer and she was taking care of him, Christian found love with some other woman, named Xenia.

Now that their son has recovered and seems to be doing well, Christian decides that it’s time they get a divorce. The problem is that their marriage is the only thing that is left in Leonora’s life now. She can’t go back to her career because she hasn’t played violin for years. She doesn’t want to go to work at the supermarket like one of Christian’s friend’s ex-wife. Despite Christian’s arguments that he is in love with someone else, she refuses to divorce him.

Leonora gives him a choice. Either he stays with her, or he goes to jail for the tax fraud he’d committed a few years back. In any case, he is not ending up with Xenia. Being cornered by Leonora angers Christian, and he decides to kill her but ends up killing someone else, and that’s where things get even more complicated between him and Leonora.

Loving Adults Ending: What Happened to Xenia’s Body?

One of the main things needed to solve a murder is to find the dead body. It can reveal a lot of things about the crime, and often becomes instrumental in catching the culprits. Leonora knew this, just like she knew how to have a perfect alibi. When she discovered that her husband had murdered a woman believing it was Leonora, she becomes convinced that he will surely attempt to kill her next time, and might actually succeed at it. While her first instinct is to call the cops and tell them everything, she gives the situation some thought and comes up with a way to not only save her marriage but also save the future of her son. She asks Christian to kill Xenia and offers to help him with the task.

Leonora creates a perfect alibi for herself and Christian by booking a weekend at a spa. She makes sure that people see them, or at least hear them, and uses sound as an alibi. While Christian sneaks away to kill Xenia, Leonora keeps up the ruse and makes it look like her husband never left her side. However, she also knows that Christian might get cold feet, considering that he was in love with her. Her suspicion is proven right when she shows up at Xenia’s house and discovers that instead of killing her, Christian slept with her.

Leonora kills Xenia, but they can’t leave the body behind now because Christian’s DNA is all over the place, not to mention, on the dead body. After Christian copes with the shock of Xenia’s death, he and Leonora clean the house, even changing the bedsheet, so that none of Christian’s or Leonora’s DNA is left behind. As for the dead body, they realize that there is a perfect way to get rid of it.

In the days before Xenia is killed and while Christian was only considering whether or not to put forward the topic of divorce, they were also preparing for the Midsummer celebration. With his friend, Christina had set up a bonfire in the middle of the lake, which was to be lit up the day after Xenia’s death. So, instead of burying her or using any other method of disposing of her body, they decide to go with the one thing that they could do in front of everyone, with none the wiser and no evidence left behind for the cops to find. They put Xenia’s body in the bonfire.

Detective Holger had his suspicions about Christian, ever since the hit-and-run case. He becomes all the more convinced of his guilt when he discovers that Christian and Xenia were having an affair and that getting rid of her body would be in his favor if they’d had sex before she was killed. He knows that finding Xenia’s body is paramount to catching her killer, so he conducts an extensive search of the area, which leads him to the lake. While the dogs follow the scent, no one realizes that they are actually pointing towards the bonfire in the middle of the lake.

At the same time, a nervous Christian hurries to light up the bonfire, and just as the detectives watch from the other end of the lake, he burns Xenia’s body in plain sight. By the time Holger realizes what has happened, he can’t do anything about it. While the flesh is burnt, Xenia’s bones remain, but they are much easier to dispose of. In the last scene, we see that Christian and Leonora go somewhere far away, to some other lake, where Christian throws the bones in the water, never to be found again.

Do Christian and Leonora Stay Together?

A couple that murders together stays together, mostly because they are privy to each other’s crime, and divorce in their case doesn’t look like a possibility without jail. Leonora knows that if love couldn’t tie them together, crime will. Previously, when Christian had talked about getting a divorce because he was in love with Xenia, she’d stopped him in his tracks by threatening to go to the cops about the tax scam he’d pulled off at his company. Christian could neither afford the jail time nor the bad reputation for his business, so the only option left for him was to kill Leonora, which didn’t go as swimmingly as he’d expected.

If the threat of spending five years in prison had kept Christian from leaving her, a murder charge would mean that he’d never set eyes on another woman, let alone think about divorce. Christian had already killed a random woman and Leonora could hold it over him, but her leverage also put her in a dangerous position. In this situation, Christian would always see her as a threat and might kill her someday. To truly bind them to each other, she decides that the best thing is to get their hands dirty together. This way, Christian would have just as much power over Leonora and he wouldn’t feel threatened by her.

The ending of the film makes it look like Leonora’s plan has worked. With Xenia out of the way and three crimes in his past, Christian finds it best to stick with his wife. He also realizes that as dangerous as Leonora is, she is also the one who tends to get him out of hairy situations. So, after disposing of Xenia’s body, they sell their house and move to someplace else, perhaps to have a fresh start. Or, at least, to put some distance between themselves and the detective who’d grown suspicious of them. Throwing Xenia’s bones into a lake, Christian bids farewell to his past and prepares himself for the rest of his life with Leonora.

Read More:  Is Netflix’s Loving Adults Based on a True Story?

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Tv/streaming, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, black writers week, sound of hope: the story of possum trot.

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It's natural to be suspicious of an Angel Studios picture; after all, the Utah-based movie studio made its mark last year with the surprising box office success of the child-trafficking thriller " Sound of Freedom ." The film raked in $242 million off the back of a QAnon conspiracy-peddling star and the overwhelming sensation of fighting back against the godless, "woke" Hollywood system that, many devotees presume, peddle and abuse children themselves. 

So it's a surprise, maybe even a self-defeating one, that "Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot," the studio's followup, is as milquetoast as it gets. It's a feel-good story about children's welfare that takes its subject matter seriously and downplays sensationalism. It's your standard warm, fuzzy tale of Christian love that plays to the church set in ways that are hardly objectionable, even as it plays those notes straight down the middle with little finesse.

The titular Possum Trot is, of course, the setting of this based-on-a-true-story tale, a majority-Black small town in East Texas fueled by its vibrant Baptist church, led by charismatic reverend W.C. Martin ( Demetrius Grosse ). His "First Lady," Donna ( Nika King ), struggles to keep her head above water with two children and piling bills. And yet, in a moment of utmost turmoil, she hears God's voice whistling through the trees. She's been called, she says; she wants to adopt more kids. "Human ones?" W.C. barks skeptically. Still, they press on, moved by a Biblical urge to serve the needy.

It's a move that baffles Susan Ramsey ( Elizabeth Mitchell ), a caseworker jaundiced by the system's inability to help the many kids in Texas' foster system. But she sees the opportunity and lets the Martins adopt several kids from broken homes -- the most at-risk of them includes Terri ( Diaana Babnicova ), a traumatized teen who comes to them pretending to be a cat. Her quirks are played for laughs, at least at first, but blessedly, director Terry Weigel (who also writes the script alongside wife Rebekah) manage to balance the scales with no small amount of pathos.

The Martins' story inspires the rest of the town to adopt, and soon after, 77 kids come to stay with the residents of Possum Trot. From here, "Story of Hope" settles into a generally heartwarming family drama narrative, as the townspeople discover the joys and pitfalls of taking on such an altruistic mission. Sure, it feels good and Christian to take on so many at-risk kids, and the Black church community circles around each other to help out. But as bills pile up, so do tensions, as Donna, in particular, struggles to deal with the many traumas and triggers of the children she's taken under her wing. 

As these things go, Weigel directs the proceedings with a heaping helping of po-faced earnestness, syrupy music playing over wide-eyed performances dripping with conviction. It's a film steadfastly dedicated to the notion of God moving through people, and the power of the church (particularly the tight-knit rhythms of the Black southern church) to inspire selfless action. But the rhythms themselves are hardly surprising, and the two-hour runtime struggles to turn a largely event-free story into something intriguing. Don't get me wrong, it's admirable that such an agenda-based picture is willing to show the dark side of adoption: the broken hearts, the impossible cases, the strained wallets. But the film cycles through arcs of trials and victories that get repetitive by the time it features a contrived climax surrounding Terri's mental breakdown and subsequent (baptismal) redemption. As if the story weren't deceptively simple enough, Donna's voice narrates the thing to an irritating degree, forcing the themes down our throats as if Weigel didn't trust his intimate camerawork and surprisingly deft cast. 

"Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot" is hardly the right-wing propaganda that "Sound of Freedom" was; at its best, it's a heartwarming, deeply sincere message movie about the power of charity and community, one of the few Christian-geared pictures that emphasizes the religion's positive qualities rather than repeat Fox News talking points. 

As with "Sound of Freedom," "Possum Trot" closes out not just with heartwarming cuts to the real figures and the bright futures they've secured thanks to faith and community, but also with a minutes-long call to action to support the film. The real W.C. and Donna read off a teleprompter while a QR code pops on-screen, asking viewers to " Pay It Forward " and donate tickets for others to see for free. It's a novel gambit, one that skyrocketed " Freedom " to box-office success and gave Angel Studios a model for its cinematic offerings. I'm not quite sure how I feel about its model of astroturfing its way to profitability. But if it has to happen, I'd much rather it happen to a film with its heart in the right place. 

Clint Worthington

Clint Worthington is a Chicago-based film/TV critic and podcaster. He is the founder and editor-in-chief of  The Spool , as well as a Senior Staff Writer for  Consequence . He is also a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and Critics Choice Association. You can also find his byline at RogerEbert.com, Vulture, The Companion, FOX Digital, and elsewhere. 

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Film credits.

Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot (2024)

Rated PG-13

129 minutes

Demetrius Grosse as Reverend W.C. Martin

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‘Space Cadet’ Review: Emma Roberts Shoots for the Stars

In a lightweight comedy, the actress plays a bartender who dreams of becoming an astronaut. One problem: She has no qualifications for the job.

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By Alissa Wilkinson

Some of Hollywood’s most durable genre conventions have to do with outsiders and underdogs, often two categories rolled into one, who show up the self-important elites. The cowboy who rolls into town and brings justice in a not-quite-law-abiding way. The lovable con artist who makes a fool of the uppity society folks. The washed-up cop or spy called in for one last covert mission. The stereotypical sorority girl who turns out to be a secret legal genius.

That last one is, of course, the “Legally Blonde” heroine Elle Woods, a fashion major who decides on a whim to go to Harvard Law School and discovers her unconventional qualifications give her insight that her more buttoned up classmates lack. Rex Simpson, the protagonist of “Space Cadet,” bears more than a passing resemblance to Elle, and not just because the actress Emma Roberts could play, at a squint, Reese Witherspoon’s niece. (Her actual aunt, Julia Roberts, played another scrappy underdog in “Erin Brockovich.”)

Roberts’s most famous work might be in Ryan Murphy’s shows “American Horror Story” and “Scream Queens,” in which her knack for playing a certain kind of queen bee — gorgeous, cruel, one crisis away from combustion — makes her a magnetic presence. She’s great at a caricature, elevating those characters to satire without diluting their sugary poison. That flair for exaggeration would seem to make Rex Simpson the right role for her.

“Space Cadet,” a comedy written and directed by Liz W. Garcia, is cast closely along the lines of “Legally Blonde,” with some beats lifted so clearly from that movie I started to wonder if they weren’t meant as jabs. Rex is a neon-wearing bartender in Florida who wrestles alligators and loves to party on the beach, but there’s more than meets the eye: She was a bit of a science genius in high school, and dreamed of being an astronaut. When her mother died, she turned down a full ride to Georgia Tech. By the time she attends her 10-year high school reunion with her best friend, Nadine (Poppy Liu), she’s down in the dumps over her failure to, uh, launch.

A chance encounter with a former classmate who now runs a private spaceflight company sparks something in Rex. It’s time to chase her dreams. So she pops open the NASA website and decides to apply to be an astronaut. One problem, of course, is that she has absolutely no qualifications for the job. But is that a real barrier to Rex, the woman who invented patent-worthy tanning mirrors?

The movie continues in this direction, sending her to NASA in a crop top to become an Astronaut Candidate (or AsCan, a moniker that provides more than a few jokes). Here is where the “Legally Blonde” comparisons come in. There is, for instance, a scene in a classroom where Rex doesn’t know the answer to a stern professor’s question, then one later where she does, demonstrating her growth. There’s a whole sequence in which people look askance at Rex upon her arrival at NASA, thanks to her peppy, kooky outfit that signals unseriousness.

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‘The Invasion’ Review: Sergei Loznitsa’s Raw but Restrained Reflection on Life During Wartime

Ukraine's leading docmaker takes on the subject of his country's invasion by Russia, focusing less on warfare than on the everyday struggle of living through it.

By Guy Lodge

Film Critic

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“The Invasion” is built on such back-and-forth movement between hard-won joy and overwhelming sorrow, with its structural mood swings and repetitions evoking the rhythm of day-to-day survival for Ukrainian citizens. At 145 minutes, economy is not the objective here: Rather, we gain a tense of time either stalling or slipping in these trying circumstances. Elsewhere, we watch village volunteer soldiers on their delivery rounds, deftly alternating between the distribution of essential military and medical supplies and handing out Christmas presents to grateful but reticent kindergarteners. We visit one hospital where recent amputees undergo strenuous physical therapy, and another where, in the maternity ward, a uniformed soldier and his wife gawp over their newborn, their wider anxieties at once suspended and intensified by the new arrival. In a school classroom, pre-teens eagerly sing traditional Cossack victory anthems before an air-raid siren prompts them to relocate to a bunker where class continues as before — even the kids doing so with an unfazed efficiency that smacks of routine.

In the most directly war-related — and grueling — passage, we’re presented with an astonishing aerial view of a recent bomb site, combed over by emergency workers as they seek survivors amid the rubble. Apartment blocks, sliced open by explosions, endure as ghostly reminders of destroyed or vacated communities, while in another shot, a woman picks out usable bricks from what remains of her ruined home, preparing to rebuild. Away from the city, and indeed from the conflict entirely, certain traditions continue unimpeded: A river is a congregation point either for a mass baptism ritual on a chilly day, or for an escapist midsummer swim.

The flow of the seasons gives some form to these disparate scenes, only for the cycle to anticlimactically repeat itself: As the film heads into a second winter at war, spirits sink once more. Free of commentary or narration, as is Loznitsa’s wont, “The Invasion” doesn’t pursue an overriding emotional tenor by its close, volleying instead between fury, compassion, despair and guarded optimism, as it seems many a Ukrainian resident does in the course of any given day. In one of its closing images, a mother and her teenage daughters comfort each other at a memorial wall covered in photos of recently lost soldiers, their expressions caught between anguish and a kind of pride. Just as there is no end in sight yet to this war, Loznitsa’s aptly sprawling, often overwhelming film arrives at no final feeling.

Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (Special Screenings), May 18, 2024. (Also in Karlovy Vary Film Festival — Horizons.) Running time: 145 MIN.

• Production: (Documentary — The Netherlands-France-U.S.) An Atoms & Void production in co-production with Arte France in association with Current Time TV. (World sales: Atoms & Void, The Hague.) Producers: Sergei Loznitsa, Maria Choustova.
• Crew: Director: Sergei Loznitsa. Camera: Evgeny Adamenko, Piotr Pawlus. Editors: Loznitsa, Danielius Kokanauskis.

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