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Reviews
Wo hu cang long (2000)
At last a successor to Kurosawa, successful in his own right...
There's not much that cannot be said in praise for this director and not anything that deletes from a masterpiece like Crouching Tiger... Despite a relatively small number of films listed in IMDb, the actual list of nominations and awards given to Ang Lee's films speaks for itself - lately in connection with the Academy Awards late last night which yielded three well-deserved prizes for Brokeback Mountain.
It is good to see a director who is in full command of everything, who has a strong sense of poetry and who communicates true epic grandness on a scale that can be used at its full advantage whether the film is set in the Far East (Crouching Tiger...) or in the "Wild" West of USA (Brokemack Mountain). I think the greatest impression I have from these two films is a strong and warm feeling of humanity and frailty seen through an epic dimension similar to that of Akiro Kurosawa's last films, with no signs of coyness and no cloying sentimentality - Ang Lee has a straightforward approach to human suffering that can appeal to anyone, anywhere, as well as a sense of humour that gives the audience just the right degree of distance without any feeling of estrangement.
Having been a Kurosawa devotee for most of my adult life (I'm in my sixties) I was greatly relieved when, after seeing Crouching Tiger..., I could lean back and know that the Japanese master of the cinema at last had a true and worthy successor. Brokeback Mountain confirmed this impression fully.
And I'm sure that together with many other cinema-goers I can look forward to his next venture, convinced that whatever subject matter, setting and era he might choose, we can expect something truly original and spectacular (in the true sense of that word) and at the same time an intimate and personal experience...
Wozzeck (1987)
A truly superb opera -excellently conducted, directed and sung!
In many ways I think this must be one of the ultimate recorded versions of an opera. Other winners are Berg's Lulu in the 1996 Glyndebourne recording, and Don Giovanni in the masterly Metropolitan performance from 2000 conducted by James Levine. The casting in this performance of Wozzeck is immaculate - Hildegard Behrens tackling the part of Marie as few others have done; this is - I think - as problematic a role in the opera as that of Wozzeck himself. But the most unforgettable moment of this filmed version is - to me - the face of Claudio Abbado when the applause starts. Having been totally immersed in Berg's glorious music, he is "rudely wakened" from his concentration by the sounds from the audience, responding to the noise with a brief expression of pain, brilliantly captured by the camera. This is indeed an occasion where total silence with bowed heads from the audience would have been more appropriate than shouts and whistles and the dreadful sound of clapping.
I've seen and heard this superb opera in many versions, on stage and on record, but this is in many ways the most satisfying one. With singers like Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Theo Adam before him, to name just two from a very long list of superb performances in what is probably one of the most difficult male parts in all opera, Franz Grundheber has all that is required - and much more. The other singers - Philip Langridge as Andres, Anna Gonda as "Marguerete" (sic. SHAME IMDb! - her name in the opera is actually Margret) and Aage Haugland (a countryman of mine - one of Norway's best singers ever) as the doctor, just to mention some of the many outstanding performances in this production - are excellent. But the one that sends chills down my spine is the Idiot in the Tavern Scene, who is not mentioned as part of the cast.
In all - apart from the untimely applause - I have nothing to criticize here.
En håndfull tid (1989)
One of the worst Norwegian films I have seen, and I've seen many...
For some reason, unknown to me, this very early product of Norwegian director Martin Asphaug's, who since has moved to Sweden and directed a number of first-rate thrillers and more or less straight and very good "who-dun-its", has been considered a "classic", and is being revived on Norwegian TV-channels every one or two years. In my opinion, the sooner forgotten, the better...
The story (or stories, since are three or four or five which are interwoven and intertwined) is impossible; the acting varies from the almost competent to the downright awful, with a few very respectable attempts in minor parts, where some good actors have been placed; the filming of major parts of this looks more like a slide presentation or a series of glossy postcards. I'm sorry, but this is one of the few times I've fallen asleep more than three times in a cinema! To be woken up whenever somebody was killed, molested, raped or screamed when giving birth. Which happens from time to time - far too often, in fact. And the two or three nude scenes - wellll!!! - I even slept through those until someone was raped or killed or both.
The film starts almost farcically, then converts to a tragic comedy (or comic tragedy) in an old people's home. It continues as a drama, when the main character (an old man) escapes from the place, and starts wandering. And wandering he does - all of the well-nigh two hours (they seem like three!) that the film lasts - most of the film taking part in his head, where he relives The Story of His Life: clichèridden, often quite gruesome, more often embarrassingly amateurish in execution, and with strange and quite inexplicable episodes that seem to be taken from some other film with a totally dissimilar plot. Then the whole thing ends as a really awful melodrama, worthy of very early Victorian plays in that genre, or even the Paris boulevard theatres before that. Or, for that matter, may seem to cram 100 episodes of a really awful soap opera into one hour and thirtyseven minutes.
Some of the unfortunate lines in the film have become quotation party-pieces for us who don't like it (= hate it!!!), and we are in fact actually quite a few. One unfortunate line, which can be roughly translated from Norwegian as "The eagle taketh no children" (spoken in a pseudo-western-Norwegian lisping dialect) is repeated at too many regular intervals, to give a the film a "feeling" of drama (ugh!!!) and of continuity... That and other golden quotes had parts of the 1990 unfortunate cinema audience in helpless hysterics. And some us still laugh, now, after 15 years...
I would rate this as a three-minus or two-plus, and have decided on the latter. The former could have been defended on the basis of Susannah York being her usual beautiful self in a tiny cameo part. But this, I'm afraid, is outweighed by the awful acting of senior Norwegian actor Espen Skjønberg. And to this day I do not understand what or who persuaded (and paid for) Ms. York and Nigel Hawthorne to appear in this drivel.
Living myself in Western Norway, I hate to see really great and quite spectacular scenery be turned into a back-drop curtain of dubious quality. Seen through the eyes of someone from Eastern Norway (i.e. Oslo) the West-country scenes may look convincing. For us actually living here it is at best laughable - at worst insulting.
I don't know whom to blame the most: screenplay writer, director or whoever had the unthankful job of pasting this piece of dreadful rubbish together. The film, by any standards, should have sunk into oblivion as many (much better) other Norwegian films seem to have done.
Why do I write this??? I've seen it several times over the years, trying to find some redeeming features (in vain!), and to understand why it has become a national treasure. I still laugh, and I still cannot understand why this film has been taken so seriously, and for so long.
Dis - en historie om kjærlighet (1995)
How did this film ever get into a cinema???
The Bergen (Norway) Cinema director in 1995 had the sense - at the time when this ghastly film was first (and never again!) sprung upon unsuspecting audiences in Oslo and other major Norwegian towns - to refuse to show it in Bergen cinemas. He stated when interviewed that to show this to an audience of adults would be adding insults to the injuries already inflicted on other unsuspecting cinema goers.
How right he was! Of course, in a country like ours, this one-hour-and ten-(???!!!)-minute piece of pure rubbish was immediately given its (undeserved) cult status. Whether it has ever been shown again - in cinema clubs or on late evening trash programs during film festivals, one does not know. I was lucky to be spared the embarrassment of walking into a cinema, paying the exorbitant price for a seat there, only to walk out again after 10 - 15 minutes of sheer and utter boredom.
Instead, I cunningly waited until the "director" (who was hot news for the usual "5 day wonder-story" during the newspapers' silly season in July) came to this town where his (hrrrmmm!!!) masterpiece was not to be shown, to sell and sign video versions of "DIS". I couldn't resist the temptation (who would?!) - and collected enough money from friends and colleagues (the equivalent of a bus ticket from each) to be able to queue up and buy a copy. The price of the video then was approximately the equivalent of two cinema tickets. The video was duly signed (and perhaps blessed?!) by Mr. Aune Sand himself) since I was about 40 years older (then) than the very young female teen-agers who had lined up to buy their copies.
Some weeks later, the donators were invited for dinner, and a showing of Mr. Sand's masterpiece. My wife - who had entered the wrong cinema in another town and already struggled through it - gracefully left the group after dinner, and went to do something useful elsewhere.
We, then, were left to watch it. None of us had seen it before - and as we gathered courage, refilled glasses, had some coffee and lit a few cigars and candles - we finally sat down to watch it towards midnight.
To cut a long story and an even longer stretch of boredom short: those of us who did not fall asleep (it was after a 5-course meal) or made frequent trips to the "bathroom", or went out for a quick, quiet smoke on the balcony, valiantly sat through it - all trying to stay awake during an hour where time really dragged its leaden feet through the mires of an amateur production that ideally belongs to, and should never have left, the wastepaper-basket where it should have been thrown together with the parts and scenes which were (one hopes!) discarded. One has, though, a feeling that nothing has been discarded, the way the film appears to work its way through its four endless scenes!
The video has "a bonus"... A short film (lasting 8 or 9 minutes, I think) called "Kysset" ("The Kiss"). Anyone who can sit through that without yawning 5 or 6 times or more may have a chance to sit through the first one or two sections of DIS without getting fidgety. Others, though, may feel that 60+ minutes of one's life could be spent in a better way than watching this - which is about as exciting as looking at a glass of cold water becoming lukewarm - such as, for example, sleeping comfortably in one's bed as opposed to dozing off in a chair in front of a TV-screen.
I hardly ever do the latter - life is too short and too exciting for that! - but watching this film is the closest I've come to do so.
Film (1965)
Superb silent movie star with excellent director gives Beckett his due!
This is one of the most rewarding short films I have ever seen - and I have seen many! - and it haunts me even now, more than 35 years after I saw it for the first (and only) time. That was during a cinema club season in Bergen, Norway, where part of the program was a "short film night" devoted to silent movies, short movies, and various combinations of these. The audience was clearly confused, since "Film" was obviously not what most had expected. And in company with "Nosferatu" (l922), "Freaks" (1932) and "Terminus" (1961 - a documentary of a British railway station) it did strike a very different chord than sheer horror and sober facts did.
Beckett's work at that time was slowly gaining ground in Norway, as did Pinter's - trying to promote either was an uphill task in a mountainous country unused to modern drama and more tuned to sports. The discussions in a seminar after the showing proved this... But this resistance to something obviously alien did not detract from my pleasure (and several others') in relishing a masterpiece, where nothing could have been improved on. A book called "Film by Samuel Beckett" was published by Faber in 1971, and generously offers complete scenario and a profusion of illustrations and production shots. It has also comments by Beckett and an essay by Schneider, and is a useful substitute for anybody without access to the Film itself.
Agreeing with other commentators, I can only say that this is really an absorbing and disturbing experience - quite unique! And one that leaves you thinking and wondering and shuddering for a long time.