Film Atlas (Denmark): The Celebration

Country: Denmark

Title: The Celebration / Festen (1998)

Wealthy patriarch Helge Klingenfeldt-Hansen is celebrating his 60^th birthday with his extended family at their sprawling hotel estate. Tension is already high among his grown children which include Michael, a volatile adulterous family man, Helene, a globetrotting career woman whose liberal attitude and black boyfriend bristles the stiff-necked guests, Christian, a troubled loner and Linda, his twin sister, recently dead by her own hand. At the big dinner that evening Christian shocks the gathering during a dramatic toast in which he reveals that Helge sexually abused him and Linda when they were children. His accusations fail to register for some and are treated as tasteless jokes by others. Even his sibling Michael responds with, in order, skepticism, anger and violence. But the façade of family mirth and cohesion is too rotten to survive the long-delayed blow and once it starts crumbling all the secrets, grudges and bigotries shake loose.

The Celebration was the first and, in all likelihood, the best of the Dogme 95 movement, a Danish-led return to naturalism whose manifesto advocated handheld camerawork  and a rejection of special effects, studio sets and lighting, post-production audio and the worn-out crutch of genre conventions. The film launched director Thomas Vinterberg onto the international stage, but he followed it up with a decade of critical failures while his coconspirator Lars von Trier (whose only Dogma 95 film is, ironically, one of his worst films) went on to enjoy a career of challenging, provocative breakthroughs. 15 years later, however, Vinterberg has happily returned to form with The Hunt, a film that revisits the theme of child abuse from a very different angle, this time following a teacher accused of an incident that didn’t happen, proving that he still has plenty to say. And while The Celebration has all the jolting outrage of an angry young filmmaker out to rewrite the rules, The Hunt takes a more mature and thoughtful approach, tapping a wider emotional register with an arguably lighter touch.

The film community later soured on Dogma 95, which set itself up for the inevitable backlash, but the raw talent that went into The Celebration still holds up. With all the brash energy and angry antiauthority of a newborn movement it’s hardly surprising that its proudly low-fi shot-on-digital aesthetic was a major influence on young filmmakers in Europe and the states. Vinterberg cleverly marries the grungy underlit cinematography to suitably dark material and presents the story in a faux-improvised manner that uses documentary intimacy as a way to get around our defenses and under our skin. All the same, the intention here, or at least the outcome, isn’t quite realism. Vinterberg’s moral indignationat the corruption within the sacred institution of the bourgeois family and the hypocrisies of ugly old-world conservatism has a gleeful edge of hysteria that threatens to overwhelm the mannered microcosm he’s concocted. Perhaps its OK that underneath the intense discomfort he stirs up he's either giving us the finger or winking at us impishly (it makes up for all the film’s glowering), or maybe it’s dangerously symptomatic of a today’s post-sincerity filmmaking where stylized individual cynicism is the weapon of choice against society’s impersonal cynicism. I’m not sure. Either way, The Celebration is interesting, vital and emotionally charged; a reliable recipe for heated discussions worth having with your friends and coworkers.

My Favorites:

The Word / Ordet

The Elements of Crime

Dancer in the Dark

Breaking the Waves

The Celebration

Dogville

The Hunt (2012)

Zentropa

Meloncholia

Terribly Happy
Gertrud
Pusher
Hunger (1966)
Brothers (2004)

Major Directors:

Susanne Bier, Carl Theodor Dreyer, Per Fly, Nicolas Winding Refn, Thomas Vinterberg, Lars Von Trier

Sundance 2010

Sine I've not posted this year, I've let slip the chance to have topical discussions about the 2009 year-in-review, various Oscar-related issues and my experience at Sundance. But to assuage my guilty conscience I will briefly summarize the latter.

Katie and I stayed in the mountains next to Salt Lake City with our good friend Exactly Why at her gorgeous home and got to try a lot of local cuisine. We made it to 6 movies, already ably reviewed over at Exactly Why's blog. I'll give a quick rundown in my own words:

The Red Chapel - A subversive documentary about a 'spastic' Danish comedy team that travels to North Korea for a tense and awkward cultural exchange. The film says as much about the ethics of the comedians and film crew as it does about the country and ultimately runs the gamut from outrageous to depressing. Wry and thought-provoking, I can't fault Sundance for awarding this their International Documentary award.

Obselidia - A gentle road-movie romance about a reclusive collector of obsolete things and a woman who runs a silent movie theater. While it was thankfully not overly-precious (like too many of the recent rash of 'quirky' indie hits), it can be a bit on the preachy side, though I felt its heart was largely in the right place. Great acting, a comfortable script and an assured pacing made this a very charming and worthwhile little film.

Enter the Void - Gaspar Noe (Irreversible) brings his latest experiment to its third audience (after controversial Cannes and Toronto screenings) and it is both his most abrasive and most visually daring yet. Enter the Void is told primarily from the drifting perspective of a drug dealer's disembodied soul seeking reincarnation as he shifts in and out of his past and the grim present of his sister's deteriorating life as a stripper in neon-lit eye-searing Tokyo. Noe's trademark whirling camera antics are impressive, and yet unpleasantly dizzying and ultimately tedious. Working with an interesting concept and no shortage of auteur flare, the film struggles to find somewhere to end and, after 155 minutes and half a dozen opportunities to walk away with a dignified finish, bellyflops into an audacious, ill-adviced and hilarious finale (think orgasms, CG and a verrry intimate POV). Noe came out afterwards and confessed that we weren't supposed to laugh. For all that, I kind of admire the film, in that no-holds noble failure type of way.

Incidentally, when asked during the Q&A about his next project, Noe shyly admitted it would be an out-and-out porno. He didn't sound like he was kidding. With Lars von Trier (Pink Prison), Steven Soderbergh (The Girlfriend Experiment), Crispin Glover (It Is Fine. Everything Is Fine), and Kevin Smith to name a few, there seems to be more of an uptick in serious artists interested in the subject matter than I can remember since P. T. Anderson's Boogie Nights .

Tucker & Dale vs Evil - A spot-on horror comedy that presents a common film scenario (teens on a campy trip beset by villainous locals) from the sympathetic side of the rednecks. Tyler Labine and Alan Tudyk (Firefly) are perfectly cast as two lovable hillbillies who rescue (not kidnap) a beautiful psych student and befriend her while her former pals get themselves killed with such persistence that Tucker and Dale believe them to be a violent suicide cult. The semi-gimmicky plot actually manages to sustain itself pretty well and the film earned constant laughs from me, my friends and the entire audience. It is actually more entertaining than most of the films it riffs on, such as Friday the 13th, The Hills Have Eyes, Wrong Turn and even Deliverance.

Buried - Ryan Reynolds wakes up in a coffin and soon receives a cell phone call that if he can't arrange for a million dollar ransom, he will be left to suffocate. The camera never cuts outside of his tiny confines, creating an incredibly tense and utterly claustrophobic nightmare scenario that manages to stay exciting during every minute of depleting oxygen. The films even manages a good deal of creative visual variety through changes in angle and light source; the yellow of a lighter's flame, the faded red of a flashlight, the cold blue of the cell phone, the eerie green of chemical glow sticks and the amble use of pitch black create a balance of mood and practicality. Though contrived, it is easy to overlook the weaker plot points. The film easily earns a spot amongst the great low budget horror films of the digital era.

Splice - Speaking of which, Vincenzo Natali, the Canadian wunderkind behind low-budget high-concept horror classic Cube, unleashes his new genetics-experiment-gone-wrong thriller. Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley play a pair of married researchers whose gene-spliced anti-body incubator becomes a beloved pet and eventually a surrogate child. The film plays like an even-more-allegorical modern-day Frankenstein where far more than just medical ethics gets ludicrously violated. The acting and effects are top-notch, but the script may be an acquired taste. Fans of early Cronenberg or anyone willing to mix parenting woes and childrearing psychology with science-fiction and horror conventions will certainly enjoy.

Overall Sundance was a wondeful experience and I felt like all the films we saw were either highly entertaining or at least very interesting. I hope to go again next year. Katie has recently moved out to Vernal, Utah (where there's a good chance I'll one day join her) so we may be "right next door" in the midwestern 3-4 hour sense.

SLIFF 2009 Coverage Part 1

Title: Edgar Allen Poe’s Ligeia

Director: John Shirley

Country: USA

Score: 5.0

Review:

A professor of Romantic poetry with a happy carefree relationship finds himself entranced by a dark and mysterious student, with the odd name of Ligeia, who is conducting shady experiments on the nature of mortality in the university labs. Half hypnotized, half seduced, the hero is soon married to Ligeia and ensconced in a Ukrainian castle where he becomes aware of her paranormal efforts to cheat the grave.

In the great tradition of Poe adaptations (such as Roger Corman’s low-budget classics), this film shares only a few superficial ideas with the original story and largely plays up the sensational aspects (in this case the sex appeal, rather than the gore or terror). Also according to Poe-adaptation tradition, neither myself nor my friends could resist seeing this film, especially considering its Friday the 13th timeslot. I enjoyed seeing my alma mater used for quite a bit of the film’s first half and was most impressed by the remarkable cinematography and lighting. I was perhaps overly pleased by the campy screenplay and playful trashiness, which didn’t particularly resonate with some of my fellow viewers, but I thought it made for a rather entertaining, if uninspired, diversion.

Title: Terribly Happy

Director: Henrik Ruben Genz

Country: Denmark

Score: 9.0

Review:

Genz’s Danish comedy-thriller, set in a boggy rustic village with a wealth of secrets and infused with noir and western influences, was probably the most fun film I saw at this year’s festival. A city cop with a history of anger management issues is sent to replace the sheriff of a small soggy Jutland town as a form of provisional punishment. The place is quiet; clearly too quiet. Our hero hardly comes across his first report, a seemingly cut-and-dry case of domestic abuse, before he is sinking inexorably into a mire of moral compromise and corruption.

Playing like a Danish Coen brothers film, but with a voice of its own, “Terribly Happy” is a brilliant example of how you can blend genres and still make a thoughtful film with local color. The oft-visited bog where the evidence of innumerable secrets and crimes are sucked into oblivion, offers a deliciously morbid backdrop to the action while serving as a perfect metaphor for the hero’s reluctant integration into the community. The humor and awkwardness keep the film from being even the slightest bit depressing, while the frequent and unexpected plots convolutions make the deliberate pacing feel lively and tense.

Review of The Element of Crime

Danish film director Lars Von Trier has remained one of the most consistently controversial and provocative filmmakers of modern times and can even take much of the credit for an entire movement: Dogma 95. Yet despite cutting a sharp international profile, Trier remains largely an enigma and his films are often difficult to gage or interpret. He is fickle, inflammatory and often silent about his motives, sincerity and meaning. For these reason, many of his films match their maker in mysteriousness and inscrutability, and none so thoroughly as his debut film: The Element of Crime (1984).

Though I called this a review in the title, I’m really writing this as an essay and it is best read by those who has already seen the movie. My goal is to attempt to shine some light on the film, which has previously evaded in-depth critical attention (Peter Cowie’s essay for the Criterion edition excluded). I’ll do some conventional film analysis, proposing some possible readings and interpretations for The Element of Crime by discussing the plot, references and symbolism. The analysis will serve as a springboard for the second part, which will mention the ways that Trier’s personality and directorial style interface with the film itself.

NOTE: The element of crime has a variety of contexts in this discussion. For the purpose of clarity when writing the phrase, italics will be used for the film’s title, double quotes for the book within the film and single quotes for the criminology method described by the book.

The film takes place entirely within a hypnosis-induced flashback and concerns the investigation of a child serial killer, known as the “lotto murderer,” who has been terrorizing Germany. Chief Inspector Kramer has called Detective Fisher back from Cairo (after 13 years exile) to solve the case following the failure of his mentor, Osborne. Fisher discovers that Osborne suspected a man named Harry Grey (who apparently died in a car accident) and was re-enacting his journey using a tailing report from three years earlier when Grey first laid his groundwork for the murders. Using Osborne’s controversial method known as ‘The Element of Crime’ (a dangerous psychological technique for getting deep into the mindset of the killer) Fisher picks up where Osborne left off. During his investigation, Fisher teams up with an Asian prostitute named Kim and moves inexorably closer to the truth… and to madness, not unlike his mentor.

[Image: A series of early double-exposures provides a disjointed account of the murder case so far. In this shot, the fire from an actual car crash is superimposed over a photo of a crash.]

[PLOT SPOILERS next paragraph.]

After determining that the crime scenes are forming the letter H (as seen from a map), Fisher lays a trap for Grey at the seventh and final point that would complete the pattern. While waiting with a young girl selected as bait, Fisher accidentally drops the killer’s calling card, which he had picked up at the scene of the first crime. The girl panics and screams and Fisher suffocates her while attempting to keep her quiet. Some time later, Kramer reveals that Osborne was responsible for the sixth murder and mistakenly credits the final one to him as well. Kim is revealed to be Harry Grey’s former wife, and briefly the wife of Osborne as well. Fisher is left free, but unable to wake from his session of hypnosis. He has, like Osborne, become the elusive murderer he sought to capture and now remains trapped within his own nightmare flashback.

[Images: Fischer’s revelation that Oswald has a child (Top) immediately cuts to the detective pulling up to the latest crimes scene (Bottom). The shots are linked by a curious graphic match in which Fischer’s car mimics the arrival and crash of a toy car (visible at the bottom of the top image.).]

The Element of Crime is told in a cryptic style, full of symbols, allusions, ambiguities and contradictions. The lighting is done with high-pressure sodium bulbs [1] that lend the film an orange tone (quite a bit more intense than sepia) broken only occasionally by highlights of green or blue. The shooting was done exclusively at night, usually during the rain. The narration is in strict monotone that distances the audience from any emotional connection to the characters. The camerawork is highly experimental, with a preponderance of overhead shots. The mise-en-scene is dense and disturbing, full of abandoned buildings, pools of dripping water, dead and dying horses and, everywhere, the decrepit and broken artifacts of decaying post-war Europe. Almost every minor character is bald.

[Image: (Top) A blue light flickers on the ceiling. (Bottom) A TV plays an old video of Oswald attempting to solve the lotto murders.]

Both the plot and the style refuse passive consumption and easy interpretation. In trying to understand what its all about, I’ll expose some of the many references (both to film and to literature) and analyze the symbolic value of three of the film’s reoccurring motifs: water, bungee jumping and primates.

[Image: In this ever-raining, ever-saturated Germany, the sand that spills from Fischer’s leg cuffs will be his only reminder of his life back home in Egypt.]

Within the first five minutes of the film, Lars Von Trier exercises his familiarity with European art cinema. The opening images of a horse thrashing about, replicates a similar shot from Tarkovsky’s Andrei Rublev (1966) [2] and foreshadows the use of horses as a reoccurring image throughout the film. Tarkovsky can be considered as a “European” filmmaker by tradition if not by birth. As the protagonist’s hypnosis begins, the camera makes a slow overhead trip past objects eroding underwater, a homage to a similar sequence in Tarkovsky’s Stalker (1979). This technique (a deliberately paced, birds-eye-view shot that migrates horizontally over decaying vistas) reappears throughout the film and instills an atmosphere of calculated dread and tragic fate, emphasizing the gradual, but meticulous, inevitability with which nature corrodes the works of man.

[Image: Kim lying in a corona of light bulbs. One of many disconcerting overhead shots.]

The opening hypnosis scene also recalls two of Trier’s favorite filmmakers. The strange Cairo-Germany connections within the film are reminiscent of German director Werner Herzog’s The Engima of Kaspar Hauser (1975) that concerns an idiot-savant untouched by civilization and haunted by ethereal visions of Egypt (shot, like the fragmentary images of Cairo in The Element of Crime, on 8mm stock that contrasts with the rest of the film). In Herzog’s next film, Heart of Glass (1976), the equally audacious director placed his entire cast under hypnosis to drain them of affect (like the monotone narration of The Element of Crime) and create a dreamlike ambience. Trier frames his film within the tale of a hypnotized patient to similar ends, blending the rural doomsday in Heart of Glass into the urban menaces of modern noir. Years later, Herzog would return the nod by appearing in the dogma film Julien Donkey-Boy. In interviews [1], Trier is also quick to credit his idol, Carl Theodor Dreyer, who used hypnotism in Gertrud (1965).

Trier’s references don’t extend merely to his filmmaking forbearers. The Element of Crime is littered with dozens of quotes that range from children’s nursery rhymes like “Oranges and Lemons” and “This is the house that Jack built” to serious poetry like Ludwig Uhland’s melancholic war remembrance “I Had a Comrade” (partially recited within the film by Osborne, in its original German) and a section of “In the Greenest of the Valleys” by Edgar Allen Poe (another Trier favorite) that is so obscure that even the Criterion edition of the DVD incorrectly transcribes the quote. Here it is corrected:

“In the monarch thought’s dominion. It stood there. Never seraph spread a pinion over fabric half so fair.”

The brooding Poe poem, taken in full, evokes images of desolation and decay; the remainder of a once-great kingdom brought down by evil creatures. At one point, Trier even has Fisher quoting James Joyce’s modernist landmark, “Finnegan’s Wake.”

These quotes serve several purposes at once. On a purely aural level, they help modulate the tone of the film, adding to the timeless unsettling ambience. There is a hint of Brechtian alienation, not just in the obscurity of the lines, but in the failure to integrate them (except thematically) into the story. One might be tempted to see them as little more than pretentious red-herrings, dropped to give the impression of erudition and sophistication, except that in the hands of Trier, they share equal footing with Mother Goose, TV shows like Kojak (1973 – 1978) [2] and popular sex jokes. Rather, the eclectic sources that Trier draws from seem to represent Western cultural output taken as a whole. Nothing is spared, from animals to art; from architecture to morality. In Osborne’s insane final request to burn all the books in his library and all the papers of his life’s work, we can see Trier’s vision of a collapsing civilization feeding the flames of their Earthly hell with the detritus of their former cultural glory.

However, the apocalyptic reading of The Element of Crime only gets at the feel of the film; a deeper look at some of the film’s reoccurring images is necessary to provide further insight. The title seems to be the single most important key, as the plot hinges upon the titular criminology technique that Osborne has developed. There are several scenes in which a glowing blue television screen plays a tape of old interviews with Osborne. In these interviews, and ones that Fisher has in person, Osborne suggests that crime is like a chemical reaction that can only occur under precise conditions. This is the “element” of crime, the environment in which it propagates like a contagious disease. In Trier’s own words, “The element of crime is the force of nature that intrudes upon and somehow invades people’s morals.”

[Image: Scenes of people shooting or screaming into the darkness form a motif of utter desperation throughout the film.]

Reading the term “element” as literally as possible (one can not overlook playful word games when dealing with Trier), one would quickly conclude that the element of crime is water. Water serves as the principle guiding motif of the entire film, saturating nearly every location. A canal runs by Osborne’s house, the police headquarters’ archive is flooded, the harbor, the ferry, the Dive and the tunnel of love are dominated by bodies of water. Rain pours down over every set in between. The extreme wetness of Germany lies in sharp contrast to the implied dryness of Cairo, where Fisher speaks of the city being entirely “sanded over.”

[Images: The perpetual rain swamps nearly every set piece, including the police archives where Fischer drifts about, discarding documents into the waterfall the pours from the abandoned elevator shaft.]

Water serves as a menacing figure within the film, aligned with the powers that erode and corrode. Far from being a symbol of purity and cleansing, water in The Element of Crime is a taxing and burdensome obstacle filled with filth, wreckage and death (several shots show the real corpses of horses floating in the murky depths). It provides no relief (as Fisher says, quoting “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” “Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink.”) and indeed, seems to transmit the murderous tendencies of Harry Grey like a disease. Water is also a conduit for the malaise and fatalism of the locals, whose single athletic activity is a dangerous ritual known as The Dive.

[Image: An abandoned factory completely filled with empty upright bottles...]

The Dive is probably the second most conspicuous facet of the film if one notes how tangential it is to the primary plot. It entails jumping from a giant crane poised above a shallow lake with a rope tied around the ankle. Trier was familiar with bungee jumping (it was first done publicly in 1979 and from a crane in 1982) even at this early date. Like in the film, the real-life leapers were arrested immediately afterwards. [3] Inspector Kramer seems to have an extreme distaste for the activity, saying early on that, “They call it a ritual. I call it crime.” This grey zone between religiosity and illegality plagues Fisher throughout the film, as he follows Osborne’s dangerous path into madness with almost religious reverence. Trier’s fascination with this duality informs much of the film, and inspires him to treat the local who performs The Dive at the end of the film with special attention. The shot shows the jumper from below and savors his plummet in slow motion, imbuing the image with an almost holy aura of despair and finality. As the rope goes taut, the jumpers muscle are jarred violently and a spray of blood is vomited from his mouth. As he bobs up and down, hanging from his ankle, we are reminded of the scene early in the film where a horse is pulled by its hoof from the harbor. In the former scene, the nightmarish image of the thrashing animal flesh is exterminated with brutal precision by a police sniper. The jumper is assailed by the police in his own turn, as Kramer’s men swarm over the lake. They also discover Osborne’s body under the crane, hanging lifeless by the neck in a grim parody of The Dive.

[Image: Before taking the Dive.]

In Trier’s film, The Dive is an act of suicide brought on by the insanity consuming the town. It is a ritual and a crime all rolled into one. The Dive shows the emotional depths of despair to which we can sink as much as it displays the physical heights from which we can fall. It is in The Dive that we begin to see the human element that is so absent in the film’s tone.

[Image: After taking the Dive.]

This reminds me of to mention the most frequently cited complaints about The Element of Crime: its cold, emotionless surface, devoid of humanity and wickedly inaccessible. How is it that ‘The Element of Crime’ can allow Fisher to connect so intimately with Harry Grey and yet the film never allows us to even marginally connect with Fisher? Within the stifling madness of this civilization gone to hell, humanity and emotions have nowhere to grow. In The Element of Crime, mankind is living under the perfect conditions for crime, in a sick world where humans are reduced to their primitive instincts. Man becomes mere flesh. Trier’s camera takes a fetishistic interest in the perspiring skin and ubiquitously shaved heads of the supporting cast.

[Image: Trier (right) makes a bald-headed cameo.]

Nothing is left of “humanity” in this landscape except the basic primal drives of sex and aggression. Harry Grey, Osborne and Fisher are driven to these extremes in sequence, all of them indulging in rough, animalistic sex with Kim (note the blood we always see afterwards) and the murder of young girls. This reverse-evolution towards the unrestrained Id is given a visual metaphor by the primates that appear at the beginning and end of the film. In the opening, we see a monkey perched on the shoulder of the hypnotist, little more than a cliché until it is given relevance by the final image. In the bizarre and ambiguous concluding shot, Fisher opens the lid of a drain and sees a shivering lemur in the bottom of the hole. The sight of the exotic creature ensnared in a terrible impersonal prison, echoes the cries of the trapped protagonist as he begs, to no avail, to be awakened from hypnosis. The animal could have been anything, and a lemur is an unusual choice, especially since the monkey from the opening scene would likely still be available. An astute zoologist will note that lemurs are prosimians, an evolutionary notch behind simians (the order that includes both the monkey at the beginning of the film and humans) [3]. Within the internal logic of the film, mankind regresses backwards to a state before the first glimmer of self-awareness, and thus modern morality. This is the last stop in the tailing report, the final conclusion of using ‘The Element of Crime.’

[Images: (Top) The opening scene, the only one set in the waking world, depicts a monkey (on the hypnotist’s shoulder). (Bottom) The disturbing final image of a lemur trapped in a drain pipe.]

Having made some progress into what the film is about, one is still left with the question of why. For what purpose does Trier lead us through his nightmare vision of a Europe lost within its own physical and spiritual apocalypse? Lars Von Trier’s motives have always been, and likely will always be, suspect. Many critics have dismissed The Element of Crime as simply “art for art’s sake,” an empty exercise in style and imagery. While Trier doesn’t bother to refute, and even tends to enjoy the idea, the accusation is too easy and too lazy. It is an excuse to avoid thinking about the film or studying it closely. It is an excuse for not taking the risk that it might all be a practical joke engineered by Trier upon audiences (not realizing that this is half the fun).

Another common reading is to assume that Trier has no other intention but to provoke; that he is just trying to shock and disturb audiences. This claim is equally useless, failing to throw any real light on the film. Trier suggests a far more compelling word than “provocation” as his goal in his first public manifesto, published to coincide with the release of The Element of Crime on May 3rd, 1984. In a prolonged metaphor about the relationship of directors and their films, Trier suggests that the key to invigorating their artistic marriage is “fascination.” [1] The word seems perfectly suited to describing Trier’s own alacrity for composing images and presenting information. His films sparkle with the intensity of a director who, whatever the end result, loves to make movies.

So why The Element of Crime specifically? Why did Lars Von Trier decided to make that precise film and in that precise style? In many ways, it feels like The Element of Crime isn’t made for audiences: it certainly isn’t particularly easy to enjoy. Instead, the film seems like a highly personal project (as debut films often are), an investigation into what fascinates the young director. In this way, ‘The Element of Crime’ gets us inside the head of Lars Von Trier more so than Harry Grey. It’s all there: the technical craftsmanship that interested him so much as a child (He played with double exposures and dreamed of building a crane from wood [4]), the obsession with Europe and hypnosis that reappears in Epidemic and Europa, the references to his favorite directors and poets, the love of noir, the need for meticulous control of every detail. Trier invested so much of himself in The Element of Crime that it isn’t surprising that it fascinated him while being inscrutable to almost everyone else. Maybe the reason why Trier’s films are always so unusual, controversial and varied is that he’s always making movies about whatever interests him at the moment of filming. Trier is often notorious for his ego, and it must certainly take an enormous ego for a director to think that he is the only audience that matters. As a result, however, his films are much more interesting than those hoping to perfect a blockbuster formula for maximizing viewer demographics.

I continue to hold that it is a mistake to dismiss The Element of Crime as meaningless example of art for its own sake. The references and influences that Trier uses show a high level of historical awareness and a pessimistic engagement with the popular art cinema theme of cultural decay and collapse. Trier’s visual motifs carry with them a host of meanings and interpretations. As a completed film, The Element of Crime is an effective thriller, a technical masterpiece and an engaging exploration of Trier’s enigmatic personality, personal interests and pet themes. In the end, we may not know all the secrets behind the director’s mind, but maybe it is better this way. As long as he continues to be a curious and talented puzzle, he is sure to continue creating fresh and provocative works. The Element of Crime is certainly a promising example of how a director can turn inward, to find influences, references, symbolism and imagery that are fascinating to the individual, and to express these outwardly in creating films that are fascinating for the open-minded.

Walrus Rating: 9.5

Work Cited:

1) Bjorkman, Stig. 1999. Trier on von Trier. London: Faber Limited; 274p.

2) Cowie, Peter. 2000. The Element of Crime (DVD insert). Criterion Collection.

3) Wikipedia. May 8, 2006. Bungee Jumping. Lemurs. Available from: http://en.wikipedia.org/

4) Stevenson, Jack. 2002. World Directors: Lars Von Trier. London: BFI; 216p.

Vampire Week Part 2

Rank: 30
Title: The Addiction
Director: Abel Ferarra
Country: USA
Year: 1995
Review:
Abel Ferarra’s low-budget B/W vampire art-film is one of the more aberrant results of the 1990’s vampire explosion. Set in Ferarra’s usual New York City, the films re-imagines the city as a locus of soul-crushing physical addiction and mind-bursting intellectual nihilism. Lili Taylor takes on a rare lead role as a bright philosophy student who runs into a vampire one night (Annabella Sciorra looking memorably menacing) and soon spirals into a personal hellhole of pain and cynicism.

The film reaches for the stars with its heady blend of (often conflicting) philosophies. There is enough outright BS to keep everyone unbalanced, an effect immeasurably aided by Taylor’s unreliable mental narration. Perhaps most successful is the central metaphor of addiction, paralleling the insatiable craving for blood with the drug-dependent society of the New York fringe. Ferarra’s talent is often buried under layers of gore and monologue, but his thoughts on substance abuse and psychology are far more coherent (if you can believe it) than the similarly ambitious, but less satisfying vampire cult film “Ganja and Hess” (1973).

Taylor adequately communicates the inherit ups and downs of desperate need and unwholesome fulfillment. Her tortuous personal odyssey culminates in a graduation party of orgiastic hedonism and a prolonged collapse into moral bankruptcy. Christopher Walken has a cameo offering a possible way out, using a system of spiritual meditation and strict self-control to lead a life vampiric moderation. Taylor’s character insists on finding her own path and the ambiguous ending leads us unsure of her ultimate success.

The black and white cinematography is a definite notch above Ferarra’s usual graininess and rough imagery. The boldness of the gritty landscape with the austere crispness of the camerawork lends a contrast of in-your-face realism and inaccessible detachment. The film is undeniably talky and pretentious and yet quite sincere in its desire to communicate the tearing disparity between intellectual heights and physical depths. Throughout the feature references to global traumas, high art, scarred counterculture and personal suffering drive home the message hard… whatever that message is.

Rank: 29
Title: Vampyr: The Adventures of Allen Grey
Director: Carl Theodor Dreyer
Country: Denmark/France/Germany
Year: 1932
Review:
The well-regarded Danish director Dreyer, departed somewhat from his art-house dramas to make this early vampire film. Though outwardly embracing the horror explosion going on in America, within minutes its clear that Dreyer has an unconventional take on the vampire world.

Allen Grey is an unlucky wanderer without much background who finds himself in a strange region near Courtempierre. He is plagued by disturbing visions (possibly hallucinations) of the local peasants behaving in ghostly and unnatural ways. Unsettling shadow-plays take place in the fields, and sparse buildings suggesting the proximity of a dark mirror world. Allen takes up with a beleaguered lord in a cavernous castle and soon perceives the danger (both from illness and malicious outside forces) that are driving his daughter, Leone, to her deathbed. Overcoming his fear, our protagonist sets about to end the reign of the powerful vampire witch behind it all.

“Vampyr” is probably the most insufferably slow vampire films of all time and requires a fair bit of patience to endure. The creative visual effects and silent-era atmosphere reward viewers who can tolerate the olden style. Fans of Dreyer will appreciate of his minimalist perfection of texture and framing. The cinematography is cast in glowing, faded grays and saturated whites (an effect which coincidently causes lights to “bleed”), while shadows are reserved for silhouettes and arty compositions. Julian West (Allen Grey) is not compelling as an actor or character; the real interest lies in the demonic agents of evil and the nightmarish events of the cursed countryside.

Avoid this one if you are only a fan of the glossy vampire blockbusters of the past two decades. However, those with a taste for horror films in the vein of “The Phantom Carriage” (1921), “Haxan: Witchcraft throughout the Ages” (1922) or Dreyer’s “Day of Wrath” (1943) will find another favorite.


Rank: 28
Title: Dracula
Director: Tod Browning
Country: USA
Year: 1931
Review:
Bela Lugosi created one of the most enduring portrayals of the infamous Count in this 1931 monster-movie classic. It is probably the most famous and oft-seen Dracula movie though it is not without its disappointments. It is also the first official adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel, though it still contains many deviations – notably the ending (which always seems to get changed). The celebrity-infested borefest which is “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” (1992) keeps the original finale wherein (spoiler alert), Dracula is chased back to Transylvania and killed by a minor character while being transported by gypsies.

So what is the default cinematic Dracula story? Quick summary. Renfield goes to Dracula’s Transylvania castle to sell him a plot of land (Carfax Abbey) in London. He becomes the vampire’s insane minion, and the two head to England, where he harasses seduces and bites Lucy, a sought-after beauty. John Seward (usually Lucy’s fiancé, but here the father of her friend Mina) dispatches her. Dracula turns his attention to Mina who is saved by Seward and his vampire-expert friend, Dr. Abraham Van Helsing who puts an end to the eon-old villain by driving a wooden stake through his heart.

The film is rather sparse and simple, conforming to Universal’s successful horror model which relies little on gore and effects and more on tension and mood. Unfortunately, Tod Browning channels too much of the Victorian novel’s aloof air and gradual pace. He also translates, to detrimental effect, the stage play’s static perspective and limited character movement. Possibly the only beneficial inheritance was Lugosi, who played the hematophagous hell-spawn on the stage. The sets lack the style of later adaptations, but come closer to realism and the early scenes in Dracula’s cyclopean castle and vaulted catacombs make up for the menace missing in the later indistinguishable studio standbys.

Lugosi is the reason to see this film. He looks and sounds the part, though his physical movements are a bit restrained. His glowing eyes come courtesy of an off-screen assistant who shined pen-lights into his pupils. The Hungarian accent is all his own, and elevated otherwise ordinary lines into some of the most memorable quotes in horror history. In the first scenes alone you get: “Listen to them, Children of the night. What music they make,” (referring to wolves howling), “I never drink… wine,” and the frequently sampled, “And now… I leave you.”

Tod Browning directed better all-around horror films like “The Unknown” (1927) and cult classic “Freaks” (1932), but “Dracula” would live on in the popular conscious. For my own taste, I prefer Universal’s other horror franchise, “Frankenstein.”

Rank: 27
Title: Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night (Nosferatu the Vampire)
Director: Werner Herzog

Country: Germany

Year: 1979
Review:
Werner Herzog’s “Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night” is one of the few explicit remakes of a former vampire movie, taking its inspiration from the unofficial 1922 film “Nosferatu” and not Bram Stoker’s novel. This has some advantages, like a pre-existing supply of creepy moments and expressive gestures to draw upon, but also limits the creativity and mad genius Herzog is so known for.

The plot is almost identical to “Nosferatu’s” pared-down retelling. Jonathon Harker heads abroad to sell Wismar (usually London, but changed to match the sets and locations of the earlier German feature) property to a reclusive count. Harker’s host hones in on an image of Jonathon’s fiancée, Lucy, and is smitten. He agrees to buy a neighboring estate. Dracula then wields his powers over Harker and even (through dreams or some other telepathic bond) influencing Lucy and Harker’s employer, Renfield. Harker is eventually freaked out enough by life in the musty den of supernatural dread to try escape, accidentally incapacitating himself in the process. Nosferatu, accompanied by the plague, supersedes him to Wismar. In the cataclysmic chaos of death and disease, the count tries unsuccessfully to woo Lucy. With the help of Van Helsing and Harker’s tattered guide to vampires, Lucy learns that Dracula is the [cause of] the plague and can be destroyed through a sacrificial gesture.

The story is inevitably dull for anyone who has been through the Nosferatu/Dracula motions more than once or twice. Herzog has made changes, but his script surgery is a subtle operation and I was honestly disappointed by his lack of revisionist vision. Some of the best tweaks include a virtual flood of rats, Dracula’s self-loathing and pitiable decay and a twist ending where the vampiric legacy lives on. Herzog keeps things heavy and stylish, but with a distinct German New Wave malaise and nihilistic torpor, rather than the expressionistic play of light and shadow so integral to F. W. Murnau’s interpretation. The inspired use of Krautrock trailblazers Popol Vuh for the soundtrack enhances the detached, otherworldly ambience.

Perhaps where this version succeeds most is in the casting and acting (the three leads are each amongst my favorite European performers), something which is quite rarely true for the subgenre. Klaus Kinski makes one of the best Draculas of all time, fully committing himself to the grotesque makeup design and eccentric behavioral quirks. He brings a great deal of nuance and emotion to the character, developing the doomed melancholy and bruised romanticism more often attributed to Frankenstein’s monster or King Kong. The role of Lucy belongs to Isabelle Adjani who manages to be both sensual and distant and comes off deeper and creepier than is usually called for. Veteran actor Bruno Ganz has the most thankless role as the nominal protagonist, Jonathon Harker, but still puts in a solid performance as a bewildered man totally out of his league in the face of paranormal powers.

Rank: 26
Title: The Hunger
Director: Tony Scott

Country: UK

Year: 1983
Review:
“The Hunger” opens with a cult music video sequence of Bauhaus’s “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” which is reason enough to see the movie for some. If you’re like me, the chance to see Catherine Deneuve as a refined bisexual vampire queen with David Bowie as her dying lover is worth the rental price. However, the movie as a whole is never quite the indie masterpiece that these parts should sum up to.

Part of the problem is Tony Scott’s direction, which fails to explore anything below the surfaces he so admiringly presents. Some of the problem lies in the Whitley Strieber source novel and the unfocused adaptation. What little plot we’re given is spread thin across a vampire love-triangle where passions flare, but yearnings are never fulfilled.

Miriam (Deneuve) is an ancient vampire with culture, class and poise to spare. Every few centuries she takes a new lover (the latest is Bowie’s John) and grants them temporary immortality with the nourishment of her blood. Unfortunately, it never lasts. At the end of their prolonged, youthful life, her partners age rapidly. Unable to die, they are trapped in decrepit skeletons too weak to rise from the attic coffins where Miriam collects them.

In John’s last few hours, he visits an aging specialist (Susan Sarandon) who refuses to believe his claims and feels guilty when she sees him literally fall apart before her eyes. When she goes looking for him later, she meets Miriam and the two enter into a dance of distrust, disgust and seduction.

Tony Scott is a born stylist, and it often accounts for both his appeal and undoing. “The Hunger” has the look and feel of wealthy gothic chic, and the mood would, honestly, not be quite the same without the slow pacing, gracefully panning long takes and minimal dialogue. Though it probably could have benefited from more characters, sets and plot developments, it still excels at indulgent decadence, and remains required viewing for the hipster elite.

Good films from 2006

As you've already probably figured out the pattern I probably don't need to mention that these films didn't quite make the "great" mark but still had there moments.

********** Good Films (in alpha order) **********

Factotum:
Country: USA
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Biopic
Review:
Adaptation of Charles Bukowski stories that manages to out-deadpan the whole army of deadpan indie comedies on the market. Matt Dillon turns in a career highlight as the perpetually hung-over Bukowski who gets himself fired from every bottom-rung menial-labor job he can find.

The Host:
Country: South Korea
Genre: Science Fiction, Monster Movie
Review: (Reproduced from my 2006 St Louis Film Festival reviews)
Already the highest grossing film made in South Korea (a record broken every six months or so), “The Host” is poised for global success. It’s hard to deny its raw entertainment power, and as the first truly solid monster movie to come around in decades, it’s especially a must-see for science-fiction fans.
The story is based on a real life headline about an American mortician who forced his assistant to pour out enormous quantities of formaldehyde into a sink that drains into the Han River (which runs through Seoul, the most populated city in the world). The movie fast-forwards through several instances over the years where strange events occur around a massive highway bridge. The strange going-ons culminate with the appearance of a ferocious amphibious monstrosity (admirably realized with cutting-edge CG, originally designed with no significant debt to dinosaurs and given movements that are eerily lifelike) that moves onto the shore to wreak havoc and steal bodies to snack on later. The daughter of a squid-stand operator is soon captured by the beast, and he struggles to rescue her from the hidden lair while contending with his own government, who has sealed off him and the area because it appears the creature also carries a deadly contagious virus.
Kang-ho Song stars, having already broken into the American market through his collaborations with Park Chan-wook, Sang-soo Hong and this director’s previous effort, “Memories of Murder.” His acting talents seem a little underused as the bumbling father, and director Bong Joon-ho doesn’t quite match the brilliance of his earlier feature, but once again manages to make an engrossing genre flick that disguises some heavy social commentary and a profound displeasure for his government (and ours). Note especially the visual echo created by the Agent Yellow device near the end of the film.

Little Miss Sunshine:
Country: USA
Genre: Comedy, Road Trip
Review:
The year’s big indie hit is an Anderson-style comedy about a family determined to let their oddball daughter compete in a beauty pageant. Wise casting puts several B-list actors into a position where they can really shine, and the interplay between the family members provides some genuine laughs (though the funniest character is removed in a misguided attempt at shock emotion). The blend of understatement and absurdity makes for successful and charming entertainment, although the film owes far too much to Wes Anderson, Jim Jarmusch and Hal Hartley (not to mention National Lampoon’s Vacation) to really deserve the hype it received. Condemning the film to merely “good” status is the groan-inducing final act filled with forced catharsis, insincere motivations and the ubiquitous (and always awful) dance scene climax.

Manderlay:
Country: Denmark
Genre: Drama, Historical Fiction
Review:
Danish provocateur Lars Von Trier grinds another ax on American history in the second chapter of his American hypocrisy trilogy [my title]. This time out, Bryce Dallas Howard (Ron Howard’s daughter) takes over the role of Grace from Nicole Kidman in the superior Dogville. Grace finds herself rescuing the slaves at an isolated plantation that has continued to practice slavery decades after it had been abolished. With the help of a handful of her father’s gangsters she attempts to reverse the roles of the slaves and owners, to disastrous and ironic results.
Trier serves up another clever portion of biting American critique and Grecian tragic irony but gets lazy with his formula. Viewers of Dogville will see every twist and turn coming and will likely grow sick of the director’s patronizing, preachy tone. The acting is also below the high standard set by the first film in the trilogy.

Slither:
Country: USA
Genre: Science-Fiction, Horror
Review:
A tribute to classic B-movie alien invasion and zombie flicks. A must see for fans of old-fashioned sci-fi. Plenty of great special effects and a charismatic performance by Serenity’s Nathan Fillion.

Who Killed the Electric Car?:
Country: USA
Genre: Documentary
Review:
Interesting documentary with an admirable array of perspectives on the mystery behind the withdrawal of the electric car. Could have taken better advantage of its mystery/investigation premise, but highly informative despite lack of innovation.