Group solidarity or sheep?!

Can they ever be confused? Brilliant! So many other genuinely funny moments despite it being a fairly straight-faced piece.

What struck me most about the film was the fantastically simplistic take on some of the most far reaching concepts and 'big ideas' from philosophy to politics.

The innocent naivety of Anna portrayed the way many people feel about such large ideas and ideology throughout life, we are never quite sure how good things are, whether we want them to change, how much do we want them to change by, are things better now than before, and so on. For me, Anna was the audience, certainly me anyway, wanting to know what people actually meant, when she scratched below the surface and dared to question anybody, they frequently had no answer to the quiet, but logical sense of a young girl.

What also interested me about Anna was how much she had changed by the end of the film, was this a comment about brain-washing, following the crowd, group solidarity, sheep! Are they all one and the same thing? Are revolutionaries any better than conservatives ideologically?

Discussions in the film of socialism, capitalism, fascism and communism were balanced with the gentle prodding from the child of her parents about what they were actually talking about. 'Fascist pig' is used in settings such as this film so often that it has lost all meaning. 'Mickey mouse is a fascist'!

I thought this film was a wonderfully cynical piece, but without being condescending or derogatory to any ideas in particular [maybe communism, I like it when the boy says 'No! Santa is red and bearded!] and was quietly humorous throughout.

Finally, I will say it was a tour de force performance from the little girl Nina, she stole every scene she was in, and times it felt like a character study of her, and she was good enough to pull it off.