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Rheinische
Reviews
L'immortelle (1963)
A neglected masterpiece to set beside 'Marienbad'
How can this not yet have any IMDb comments? The reason must be its relative obscurity in the Anglosphere, in which case it definitely needs to be rediscovered.
What I had heard of Robbe-Grillet's own films suggested they were weak in comparison with his collaboration with Resnais, but 'L'Immortelle', at least, totally overturns that suspicion. The plot - what there is of one - is not too dissimilar to 'L'Année dernière à Marienbad': a man meets a mysterious woman, loses track of her, finds her again. Or does he? Is he being deceived, or pursuing an erotically alluring phantasm? Once again, the narrative is inherently ambiguous, filled with conflicting testimonies, and arguably of secondary importance to the film's treatment of space and locale.
The camera pores over a drowsy Istanbul, following its characters through shuttered windows and on to boats at sea, through cavernous mosques and ruins (which the woman claims are artificial), and crowded bazaars. The formal compositions are as impeccable as those of early Resnais, with actors arranged almost geometrically, like inanimate objects. Some of the shots are reminiscent of Antonioni, such as a slow zoom through the railings of a cemetery, or a long shot which reveals an initially bustling plaza to be deserted. The viewer's eye is tricked (mirroring the perceptual confusion of the central male character), as people appear and disappear, only to reappear within the space of a single pan. Another source of alienation is the use of Turkish speech, which 'our man' cannot understand, and therefore remains untranslated in the subtitles.
As one might expect, there is no resolution to this film: its ending is as elusive as its beginning. Some viewers might tire of the repetitiveness of its structure, as scenes are replayed and memories recollected, but I can practically guarantee that fans of Resnais will find much to enjoy. Other later points of comparison might be David Lynch, or the analogous atmosphere of Oriental anxiety in Cronenberg's 'Naked Lunch', but Robbe-Grillet ought to be regarded as a major cinematic artist in his own right, just as he has long been highly regarded for his literary output (the fact that he also published 'L'Immortelle' as a 'ciné-roman' suggests his belief in the continuum between the two artforms).
Postscript: I have subsequently had the opportunity to watch Robbe-Grillet's latest, 'Gradiva' (2006), and unfortunately it leaves one wondering how the mighty have fallen: a sloppy and ridiculous piece of 70s-style pseudo-erotic fantasy (think Borowczyk, but not as good) which totally lacks the visual precision and intellect of 'L'Immortelle'. I can only surmise that his film-making career went downhill steadily after the 1960s, but we should probably cut an 85-year-old man some slack.
I Love Dollars (1986)
Surely one of the great documentaries of the 1980s
In 1984-85, the Dutch documentarist Johan van der Keuken took his camera across the globe, from Amsterdam to New York to Hong Kong, ending in Geneva. The object of his investigation in this film is money, in particular the maniacal drive to accumulate it in the era of Thatcherite/Reaganite neoliberalism. As well as a succession of bankers, traders and executives (including the odiously self-congratulatory British chairman of the Hong Kong Jockey Club), van der Keuken also interviews the victims of economic dispossession, such as the residents of dilapidated dwellings in New York, or illegal Portuguese immigrants in Switzerland (who, ironically, have a son who dreams about the promised land of New York). Flashes of the Third World (which the financiers admit is of no interest to them) appear on flickering TV monitors, indicating its remoteness from the centres of capitalist power, as embodied in the sanitised streets of Geneva.
Van der Keuken's orientation is clearly that of a sceptical leftist, but his own interventions are kept to a minimum. There is almost no narration, just a few occasional remarks. In the Vertovian documentary tradition, he lets the camera explore its environment, with an attention to aesthetic detail (crowds reflected in polished corporate exteriors; digital displays on the stock market; beggars and children moving along urban pavements; Chinese New Year decorations) that sets this apart from more conventional reportage. In its epic sweep, it is vaguely reminiscent of the more acclaimed 'Sans soleil' (1982) by Chris Marker. Less 'poetic', less impressionistic than Marker's film, 'I Love $' is nevertheless, in my opinion, perhaps the greater achievement.
Giovanna d'Arco al rogo (1954)
A fascinating curiosity
This is generally regarded as a 'minor' work by Rossellini, and in a certain sense one can see why its appeal is limited: a filmed document of an Italian production of a French opera; a stagy Catholic confection with a largely static Bergman at its centre. Anyone expecting something to fit alongside the versions of the Jeanne d'Arc narrative by Dreyer (1928) or Bresson (1962) is likely to be disappointed.
However, there is a strong case to be made for 'Giovannia d'Arco al rogo' as a fascinating and overlooked work. Regardless of what one feels about Honegger's somewhat erratic music (which I felt was not without its charm), the film inadvertently raises various questions about cinematic form. It may be a recording of a theatrical staging, but the act of filming transforms the experience of watching such a staging. There is a dialectical tension between the obvious artifice of opera and the documentary reality of the camera. We see Joan of Arc beholding various theatrical tableaux - her trial depicted as an animal fable; an absurd game between monarchs; some village revellers - but at the same time we also see Ingrid Bergman-as-Joan of Arc, and moreover Ingrid Bergman-as-object of Rossellini's camera eye. I was reminded of some of the opulent pageants of Peter Greenaway ('Prospero's Books', 'The Baby of Macon'), who approached some of these paradoxes in a much more self-conscious manner some 40 years on. To make matters even more Brechtian, the reel in the screening I saw was preceded by what appeared to be some promo/actuality footage, featuring the clapping opera house audience and a smiling Bergman in her dressing room; presumably this juxtaposition was not intended by Rossellini himself, but it adds something to the overall experience.
Unfortunately, this film seems destined to be restricted to retrospectives and the occasional archival screening. In the print I saw (apparently an 80s preservation), the colours had faded to a ghostly pallor, presumably a result of Rossellini's use of volatile Eastmancolor stock. Not an obviously bankable choice for DVD distributors, then. But anyone who has an interest in the philosophy of film in relation to theatre, or mixed modes of artistic representation, should watch it if given the opportunity.
Schattenland - Reise nach Masuren (2005)
Figures in a landscape
Shooting on digital video, Volker Koepp ventures into the 'Schattenland' (shadowland) of Masuria, a lake land region in the north-east of Poland, bordering on the Kaliningrad Oblast, and part of East Prussia until 1945. There he encounters a variety of people: poor Ukrainian farmers who settled after the Second World War, estranged from Poland but with no obvious links to Ukraine; fishermen scraping a living, chipping through ice to seek their meagre catch; a young architect from Warsaw and his Lithuanian partner in their holiday home, attracted by the scenery; a retired German newscaster, reminiscing about the post-war flight of the German population.
In the best documentary style, these interviews are unobtrusive, focused entirely on the speakers, in their homes or in the fields, and interspersed with footage of the land - water, trees, clouds, snow, light. It is long enough to leave room for contemplation, overspilling the standard one-hour slot given to made-for-TV docs (in Britain at least: perhaps German TV is better).
Unfortunately, although the interviews (mostly in Polish and Russian/Ukrainian) were subtitled in English, there were passages of German historical narration (read out by Koepp?) earlier in the film which were not subtitled. I do not speak German, but I could gather from the reference to dates (I can stretch to 'Jahrhundert') that he was talking about the Prussian legacy of Masuria and its ruins. Since this film is unlikely to circulate much outside Germany, I cannot really complain.
'Schattenland' is an elegiac study of a neglected place, achieved without aggressive montage or staged controversy; in other words, an exemplary vindication of low-budget, minimal, digital film-making. I saw this at an institution with a 'digital cinema'; hopefully the future proliferation of these will allow the bypassing of commercial distribution and the considerable expense of producing film prints.
Bariera (1966)
Somnambulant style
Seeing 'Barrier' (screened as part of a series of 'lost' films), I was left lamenting the general unavailability of Central/Eastern European cinema in the West, for this film rivals the best productions of the French and Italian New Wave. It combines the breeziness of early Godard - photogenic youths talking, walking - and the luminously austere monochrome visual composition of Antonioni, with an additional air, dream-like, anxious, almost threatening, of what might be called surrealism.
Needless to say, plotting is not the focus, as the film follows the aimless wanderings of an alienated young man, struggling to define his own existence in the apparent void of post-war Poland. In the deceptive opening shot, unidentified wrists appear helplessly tied behind an unidentified back, a scene of torture that metamorphoses into student boredom. Crowds rush through empty spaces, to a soundtrack that veers from jazz to choral hymns; a tram moves slowly through the landscape, driven by a similarly lost young woman; magazines are turned into paper hats for an impromptu party in a restaurant; a poster encouraging blood donation recurs, its beckoning finger indicative of the inescapable state bureaucracy.
Despite its frequently languorous pace, 'Barrier' clocks in at just over 80 minutes, yet achieves something greater than many films do in twice that time. This ought to be remembered as one of the major films of the 60s; perhaps it is in Poland. Skolimowski, like his more famous contemporary Roman Polanski, ended up leaving his homeland to make films abroad, but this earlier work is presumably the creative pinnacle.
Svetlonos (2005)
An extraordinarily atmospheric animation
On finding out that this film is the creation of Jan vankmajer's son, Václav, one could be forgiven for expecting a derivative imitation of his father's pioneering stop-motion animation style. However, 'The Torchbearer' acquits itself as a major and distinctive work in its own right, arguably the greatest sub-30-minute film of 2005. Visually, it is in a more 'classical' vein than any of vankmajer Sr's messy and visceral shorts: the film follows the passage of an austere and silent figure in Greco-Roman armour through a castle resembling one of Piranesi's imaginary prisons, and inhabited by female statues who come to life and watch from the shadows (I won't go into the further details here, since I couldn't do them justice anyway). Both the structure and the imagery of the film seem to invite possible allegorical readings: temporal cycles, the rise and fall of kings, the martial invasion of a matriarchal space, etc. (although the absence of dialogue leaves things uncertain).
The models are crisp and realistic, and sound is put to haunting use: creaking pulleys, the clank of metal on stone, unidentified subterranean rumbling. In fact, if 'The Torchbearer' resembles anything, it is the Quay Brothers' sombre 'Street of Crocodiles' (itself vankmajer-inspired), although one can see that the filming technology has moved on in the intervening twenty years. This film deserves to be seen not only by vankmajer/Quay enthusiasts, but anyone who remains sceptical about the power of animation to create genuinely 'dark' environments that rival live-action productions. I saw it amongst other shorts (both hand-drawn and CGI) at an animation festival, but it made everything else seem weak by comparison. Unfortunately I doubt this will reach much beyond the orbit of the international festival circuit, and Václav's father's name may be more of a hindrance than a help to him, but I would recommend keeping an eye out for it.