Philippe Barcinski's "A Escada" ("The Ladder") is a curious metaphorical journey into a man's soul and the one obstacle in his life while climbing
up a ladder. Our leading man (Luciano Chirolli) has one challenge: to go all the way through a long set of stairs. At first view, it appears a
simple ladder with an ending (we can see the whole thing, it's not that long) but when he begins his journey the editing and the optical illusion
effect makes it look like an endless ladder of which drives the man to questioning things and make his journey all the way down in a very dramatic
manner.
Along with the amazing and melancholic black-and-white cinematography, there's one of many Bachianas composed by the great classical composer Heitor Villa-Lobos (if I'm not wrong, it's the numbr 4, which played ad nauseum in the miniseries "Presença de Anita" and that's how I got acquainted with) as soundtrack through the whole ordeal.
But what Barcinski is trying to do here? While the imagery is simple, its meaning and possible theories are not. There are thousands of ideas to be deciphered and to be deeply analyzed. A take of mine that works in a global way relates to accepting defeat and feeling serene when things don't go according to plans. Pay attention to his reaction after falling down over and over the steps and then stopping at some point. There's a quiet resignation evident there and he simply accepts it. And we wonder if that goal of reaching to the top was actually all that worthy since the rush to reach there was pointless, it never ended. But hey, there's a part of all us that simply refuse to give up our (sometimes) pointless goals.
The hardest part is to know when...
That's just my take about it, there's plenty of other valid interpretations or you could simply admire (or don't) the scenes as they are played like a man going all the way up to later on go all the way down and stop in between. The way you see it, it's the reward you're getting it.
I was quite impressed by many of its qualities, the editing, the composition of images, the use of classical music to heighten the dramatic moments.
8/10.
Along with the amazing and melancholic black-and-white cinematography, there's one of many Bachianas composed by the great classical composer Heitor Villa-Lobos (if I'm not wrong, it's the numbr 4, which played ad nauseum in the miniseries "Presença de Anita" and that's how I got acquainted with) as soundtrack through the whole ordeal.
But what Barcinski is trying to do here? While the imagery is simple, its meaning and possible theories are not. There are thousands of ideas to be deciphered and to be deeply analyzed. A take of mine that works in a global way relates to accepting defeat and feeling serene when things don't go according to plans. Pay attention to his reaction after falling down over and over the steps and then stopping at some point. There's a quiet resignation evident there and he simply accepts it. And we wonder if that goal of reaching to the top was actually all that worthy since the rush to reach there was pointless, it never ended. But hey, there's a part of all us that simply refuse to give up our (sometimes) pointless goals.
The hardest part is to know when...
That's just my take about it, there's plenty of other valid interpretations or you could simply admire (or don't) the scenes as they are played like a man going all the way up to later on go all the way down and stop in between. The way you see it, it's the reward you're getting it.
I was quite impressed by many of its qualities, the editing, the composition of images, the use of classical music to heighten the dramatic moments.
8/10.
