The ending of Béla Tarr's 7-hour meditation Sátántangó still haunts my soul, and let the fact I'm starting at the ending be your spoiler warning. In the movie, a group of bickering villagers is led from their farm by Irimiás, a figure they fearfully respect and whose promises they swallow. Left behind is The Doctor, who spends his days in seclusion. Suddenly, the mysterious sound of church bells (also heard at the start of the film) prompt the lumbering Doctor to actually leave his seat, almost as if faith replenishes him. However, he finds that the church is in ruin and the sounds were those of a madman hammering the remnants of the bell, repeating the phrase "the Turks are coming". He returns home and nails his doors and windows shut, sealing himself in for good. In the darkness, he recites the film's opening narration as the credits start to roll.
I find that few films beg for analysis and speculation quite like those of Béla Tarr. Just enough is kept vague and open for interpretation, but just enough is obvious too. The above paragraph gives us plenty to pontificate when it comes to false prophets, nihilism, the nature of human faith in general, and whatever else. This is to say nothing of characters like The Captain and his lecture on authority (wherein he references Pericles; one that I'd never heard of).
This is one of those movies you may use as a joke to describe what film snobs are into. If I told you that the film begins with an 8-minute take of cows on an abandoned farm, themselves eventually forsaking it, you'd probably chuckle and snort in disbelief.
However, nothing could set the film's tone of desolation more perfectly than this opening sequence. The image is a grainy black-and-white, the wind echoes between the empty buildings, the soulless cattle go about their way, and the cinematography is without fault. Some speculate that the opening also foreshadows the fate of the principal characters. Indeed, certain characters in the movie do seem as easy to herd as common livestock.
But there is more to talk about. How about the plotline about the little girl (Erika Bók) who is convinced to kill her cat due to the promises of her brother (the scene is disconcerting in how believable it looks, but a veterinarian was reportedly on set at all times)? Or the rainy night where Irimiás returns and each of the other storylines comes to a pivotal moment? Or the part where Irimiás sees the ruin where a death will take place and collapses to his knees as a fog brushes past it and vanishes? Or the non-chronological way in which Tarr and László Krasznahorkai present the narrative, aptly stepping back and forth in time as though it were a tango? You may laugh again, asserting that this is just one of those films that try to be artistic and cerebral. Possibly, but do please exert a few more mental horsepowers to determine if it succeeds, before deciding it is merely fartsy.
My praise of the film's more technical achievements is genuine, as well. The sets, costumes, and effects are completely and utterly convincing. The actors, likewise, seem at home in the movie's universe. The music by Mihály Víg, who also portrays Irimiás, captures the time period and rural environment skillfully, whilst sometimes also being quite bone-chilling. Of Gábor Medvigy's long-take photography, where the camera almost constantly hovers about the scenery, I cannot say enough.
The catalog of Bela Tarr may be the final stage of film fanaticism. He who "likes movies" starts by looking at all the new mainstream releases for fun, then he might learn about the essential old classics, then he probably seeks out something more obscure and artsy (where vision is untarnished by studio interference), soon he starts looking at straight-up weird movies, and eventually, he reaches the most impenetrable auteurs of the past. I don't know that this is the process of all cinephiles, but I know many consider it a rite of passage to sit through all 7 hours of the bleak, slow, yet endlessly muse-provoking Sátántangó. Nail your door shut and let the film swallow you whole.
I find that few films beg for analysis and speculation quite like those of Béla Tarr. Just enough is kept vague and open for interpretation, but just enough is obvious too. The above paragraph gives us plenty to pontificate when it comes to false prophets, nihilism, the nature of human faith in general, and whatever else. This is to say nothing of characters like The Captain and his lecture on authority (wherein he references Pericles; one that I'd never heard of).
This is one of those movies you may use as a joke to describe what film snobs are into. If I told you that the film begins with an 8-minute take of cows on an abandoned farm, themselves eventually forsaking it, you'd probably chuckle and snort in disbelief.
However, nothing could set the film's tone of desolation more perfectly than this opening sequence. The image is a grainy black-and-white, the wind echoes between the empty buildings, the soulless cattle go about their way, and the cinematography is without fault. Some speculate that the opening also foreshadows the fate of the principal characters. Indeed, certain characters in the movie do seem as easy to herd as common livestock.
But there is more to talk about. How about the plotline about the little girl (Erika Bók) who is convinced to kill her cat due to the promises of her brother (the scene is disconcerting in how believable it looks, but a veterinarian was reportedly on set at all times)? Or the rainy night where Irimiás returns and each of the other storylines comes to a pivotal moment? Or the part where Irimiás sees the ruin where a death will take place and collapses to his knees as a fog brushes past it and vanishes? Or the non-chronological way in which Tarr and László Krasznahorkai present the narrative, aptly stepping back and forth in time as though it were a tango? You may laugh again, asserting that this is just one of those films that try to be artistic and cerebral. Possibly, but do please exert a few more mental horsepowers to determine if it succeeds, before deciding it is merely fartsy.
My praise of the film's more technical achievements is genuine, as well. The sets, costumes, and effects are completely and utterly convincing. The actors, likewise, seem at home in the movie's universe. The music by Mihály Víg, who also portrays Irimiás, captures the time period and rural environment skillfully, whilst sometimes also being quite bone-chilling. Of Gábor Medvigy's long-take photography, where the camera almost constantly hovers about the scenery, I cannot say enough.
The catalog of Bela Tarr may be the final stage of film fanaticism. He who "likes movies" starts by looking at all the new mainstream releases for fun, then he might learn about the essential old classics, then he probably seeks out something more obscure and artsy (where vision is untarnished by studio interference), soon he starts looking at straight-up weird movies, and eventually, he reaches the most impenetrable auteurs of the past. I don't know that this is the process of all cinephiles, but I know many consider it a rite of passage to sit through all 7 hours of the bleak, slow, yet endlessly muse-provoking Sátántangó. Nail your door shut and let the film swallow you whole.