"Do you believe me? I'm in the middle of Europe screwing a Volkswagen 1200." A brilliantly esoteric pseudo-murder-mystery, The Element of Crime brings to mind the work of Paul Auster, stories like Ghosts and City of Glass. The fact that the entire film is communicated through the hypnosis-induced memories of a former detective leads to a breathtaking heightened reality that makes the film's dreamy visual sensibility irresistible. I don't know if it's thanks to Von Trier or Criterion (who deigned this movie one of the first entries into their Collection), but the print is GORGEOUS, and is damn near impossibly clean for a film made in 1984. Amadeus didn't look this good the day it came out.
Like Auster's masterpieces, the film is technically about a murder, a detective named Fisher (Michael Elphick) returning to Europe from Cairo after a thirteen-year absence, come back to investigate a child killer named Harry Grey, as informed by his mentor Osborne (Esmond Knight), a mysterious prostitute named Kim (Me Me Lai) and antagonistic Chief of Police Kramer (Jerold Wells). He is telling all this from memory to a therapist (Ahmed El Shenawi), and the atmosphere is in kind.
The film is completely shot in a burnt-umber tint, with occasional hints of blue coming through for minor things like police lights, and I can't be exact, but I would be willing to bet that the entire film is shot at nighttime, and at least 90% of it is during a severe rainstorm (Dark City, eat your heart out). It really is the doom-and-gloom special, and it's perfect for maintaining the mood the film is looking to put forth. Like Rose Hobart, it's the combination that makes all the difference. Alone, any of these elements (of crime?! No.) could have been comfortable, even soothing, but in tandem, they're haunting and unsettling, and kept me on the edge even at times when nothing of substance was occurring on screen.
This is not to say that a lot of tangible things DO occur on screen. Anyone coming into The Element of Crime looking for a straightforward detective movie, where he follows the clues and solves the crime, is going to be sorely disappointed. This is why I'm glad I had read City of Glass previously. I realized straight away that this wasn't going to be ordinary or obvious. For Fisher, what originally begins as an investigation very quickly spirals down into a series of bizarre encounters and off-the-wall experiences, and he gets so deep into his desperate search and into his own psyche that he begins to lose his identity, and damn near his capacity for rational thought, and the results are spellbinding.
Of course, considering the director, I should have realized substantially sooner than the start of the film that this wasn't going to be Agatha Christie ordinary. Ol' Lars doesn't do ordinary. Hell, even his most 'commercial' film (his office comedy The Boss of It All) is a long way from starring Will Smith, and his greatest films, like Dogville or Zentropa, are "off" just enough to be unique. I think this is the thing that attracts people who might not be aligned with Von Trier's world view, his cinematic approach, might find themselves lost in an area that they aren't comfortable with. For all you crazy kids who think you might be, give Von Trier's debut film a whirl. Be warned, though: It just might whirl you back.
{Grade: 8.5/10 (B+) / #11 (of 26) of 1984}
Like Auster's masterpieces, the film is technically about a murder, a detective named Fisher (Michael Elphick) returning to Europe from Cairo after a thirteen-year absence, come back to investigate a child killer named Harry Grey, as informed by his mentor Osborne (Esmond Knight), a mysterious prostitute named Kim (Me Me Lai) and antagonistic Chief of Police Kramer (Jerold Wells). He is telling all this from memory to a therapist (Ahmed El Shenawi), and the atmosphere is in kind.
The film is completely shot in a burnt-umber tint, with occasional hints of blue coming through for minor things like police lights, and I can't be exact, but I would be willing to bet that the entire film is shot at nighttime, and at least 90% of it is during a severe rainstorm (Dark City, eat your heart out). It really is the doom-and-gloom special, and it's perfect for maintaining the mood the film is looking to put forth. Like Rose Hobart, it's the combination that makes all the difference. Alone, any of these elements (of crime?! No.) could have been comfortable, even soothing, but in tandem, they're haunting and unsettling, and kept me on the edge even at times when nothing of substance was occurring on screen.
This is not to say that a lot of tangible things DO occur on screen. Anyone coming into The Element of Crime looking for a straightforward detective movie, where he follows the clues and solves the crime, is going to be sorely disappointed. This is why I'm glad I had read City of Glass previously. I realized straight away that this wasn't going to be ordinary or obvious. For Fisher, what originally begins as an investigation very quickly spirals down into a series of bizarre encounters and off-the-wall experiences, and he gets so deep into his desperate search and into his own psyche that he begins to lose his identity, and damn near his capacity for rational thought, and the results are spellbinding.
Of course, considering the director, I should have realized substantially sooner than the start of the film that this wasn't going to be Agatha Christie ordinary. Ol' Lars doesn't do ordinary. Hell, even his most 'commercial' film (his office comedy The Boss of It All) is a long way from starring Will Smith, and his greatest films, like Dogville or Zentropa, are "off" just enough to be unique. I think this is the thing that attracts people who might not be aligned with Von Trier's world view, his cinematic approach, might find themselves lost in an area that they aren't comfortable with. For all you crazy kids who think you might be, give Von Trier's debut film a whirl. Be warned, though: It just might whirl you back.
{Grade: 8.5/10 (B+) / #11 (of 26) of 1984}