A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence

The title of Roy Andersson's latest, Golden Lion-winning masterpiece is inspired by Pieter Breughel de Oude's 1556 The Hunters in the Snow: The maestro wondered what the birds in the painting see and might make of the strange creatures we call humans, their (mis)deeds and (mis)adventures. Like all good Surrealists, Andersson tries to look at life on Earth as if it were a civilization three solar systems away - only he actually is in the habit of building eerie, hyperrealist studio-reproductions of our world that simply look and feel alien. So he just needs to stare, with each scene a table barely vivant.
There actually is a pigeon here, in the beginning: a stuffed one, so past wondering; some zombie-like-looking human gawks at it in seemingly dull incomprehension. The film's anti-heroes, a pair of salesmen specialising in novelties like vampire teeth (with extra-long fangs!) are met by similar gazes wherever they go.