82nd VENICE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL: Silent Friend by Ildikó Enyedi.
- ultimatetrendymag
- Sep 20, 2025
- 2 min read
Silent Friend is a poetic and contemplative film that weaves together three different time periods — 1908, 1972, and 2020 — around an unusual protagonist: a majestic Ginkgo biloba tree, a silent witness to the lives that unfold around it.
Article and photos by Marco Lorè
Enyedi’s direction stands out for its delicacy, slowness, and strong symbolic dimension. The stories aren’t driven by a fast-paced narrative, but rather by a temporal rhythm that prioritizes the whisper of nature over the noise of human action.
Strengths:
The intertwining of human and vegetal: the film goes beyond simple metaphor to offer a reflection on perception, listening, and the limits of human sensitivity.
Aesthetic choices: each historical segment has its own distinctive visual style — use of black and white, texture, and cinematography — that deepens the immersive experience.
The performances (especially Luna Wedler, who won the Marcello Mastroianni Award for emerging actress) bring to life characters who balance between the scientific world and a more mystical sense of nature.
Weaknesses:
At times, the narrative intensity feels uneven: not all episodes are equally engaging, and some moments risk slowing the film down for viewers looking for a more dynamic story.
The film demands patience: it’s not designed for quick entertainment, but for those willing to let themselves be carried by imagery, symbols, and long silences.
Silent Friend stands out for its philosophical and lyrical ambition, and for its ability to make us reflect on the often-overlooked relationship between human beings and the vegetal world. It isn’t flawless, but it is undoubtedly a meaningful cinematic experience — one that confirms Ildikó Enyedi as a filmmaker capable not just of showing, but of making us feel.
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