Sergei Loznitsa is fixated on time, thematically and formally. While his follow-up to My Joy lacks the earlier film's tricky structure, which suggested a present condemned to continually echo the trauma of the past, it foregrounds the subject in other, subtler ways.
A spartan not-quite-war movie, In the Fog is set—or, perhaps more accurately, located—in Nazi-occupied Belarus. Long takes—camera carefully dollying backwards through endless forest—are the movie's stock in trade. Loznitsa uses match cuts sparingly, and because of this, each shot registers as an individualized formal / narrative structure—a chunk of real time. Edits register as gaps rather than links. The titular fog—which rolls in during the final scene—is the fog of history; for Loznitsa, the past is first and foremost a once-present.
In the Fog opens with a three-or-so minute handheld shot of a village marketplace, where disinterested Belarusians and Germans half-observe an off-screen group execution.
A spartan not-quite-war movie, In the Fog is set—or, perhaps more accurately, located—in Nazi-occupied Belarus. Long takes—camera carefully dollying backwards through endless forest—are the movie's stock in trade. Loznitsa uses match cuts sparingly, and because of this, each shot registers as an individualized formal / narrative structure—a chunk of real time. Edits register as gaps rather than links. The titular fog—which rolls in during the final scene—is the fog of history; for Loznitsa, the past is first and foremost a once-present.
In the Fog opens with a three-or-so minute handheld shot of a village marketplace, where disinterested Belarusians and Germans half-observe an off-screen group execution.
- 6/20/2013
- by Ignatiy Vishnevetsky
- MUBI
Sergei Loznitsa's stark parable about Soviet collaboration with the Nazis has echoes of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky
Sergei Loznitsa's My Joy, a fable about the increasingly nightmarish journey of a lorry driver lost in a violent post-communist Russia, was well received at Cannes three years ago but is yet to be released in this country. His second film, In the Fog, based on a highly regarded novel by Vasili Bykov, also received a warm welcome in Cannes and is one of the best Russian films to open in Britain over the past decade. It's set in Loznitsa's native Belarus in 1942, and the fog of the title is both literal and metaphorical, the fog of war that swirls around its three principal characters, Russians involved in the struggle against the German invaders.
In the Fog unfolds at a stately pace, beginning with a striking opening sequence shot in what appears...
Sergei Loznitsa's My Joy, a fable about the increasingly nightmarish journey of a lorry driver lost in a violent post-communist Russia, was well received at Cannes three years ago but is yet to be released in this country. His second film, In the Fog, based on a highly regarded novel by Vasili Bykov, also received a warm welcome in Cannes and is one of the best Russian films to open in Britain over the past decade. It's set in Loznitsa's native Belarus in 1942, and the fog of the title is both literal and metaphorical, the fog of war that swirls around its three principal characters, Russians involved in the struggle against the German invaders.
In the Fog unfolds at a stately pace, beginning with a striking opening sequence shot in what appears...
- 4/29/2013
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Iron Man 3 | The Look Of Love | Bernie | Scarecrow | In The Fog | The Lords Of Salem | The ABCs Of Death | White Elephant | I Love New Year
Iron Man 3 (12A)
(Shane Black, 2013, Us) Robert Downey Jr, Ben Kingsley, Guy Pearce, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Rebecca Hall. 130 mins
Fears of post-Avengers superhero blowout fatigue are briskly swept away by Marvel's latest epic, whose snappy, poppy script packs in twists and quips between the bludgeoning (but technically seamless) action. It's Kingsley's Bin Laden-esque Mandarin and Pearce's creepy scientist who are out to de-swagger Tony Stark this time round, but there are surprises in store for everyone.
The Look Of Love (18)
(Michael Winterbottom, 2013, UK) Steve Coogan, Anna Friel, Imogen Poots, Tamsin Egerton. 101 mins
Despite the Soho excess, the retro kitsch, the racy subject matter and the great cast, this biopic of Britain's pornographer-in-chief Paul Raymond somehow never feels like it's telling the full story.
Iron Man 3 (12A)
(Shane Black, 2013, Us) Robert Downey Jr, Ben Kingsley, Guy Pearce, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Rebecca Hall. 130 mins
Fears of post-Avengers superhero blowout fatigue are briskly swept away by Marvel's latest epic, whose snappy, poppy script packs in twists and quips between the bludgeoning (but technically seamless) action. It's Kingsley's Bin Laden-esque Mandarin and Pearce's creepy scientist who are out to de-swagger Tony Stark this time round, but there are surprises in store for everyone.
The Look Of Love (18)
(Michael Winterbottom, 2013, UK) Steve Coogan, Anna Friel, Imogen Poots, Tamsin Egerton. 101 mins
Despite the Soho excess, the retro kitsch, the racy subject matter and the great cast, this biopic of Britain's pornographer-in-chief Paul Raymond somehow never feels like it's telling the full story.
- 4/27/2013
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
When a Nazi collaborator is led into the Belarusian forest to be executed, why doesn't he protest? Sergei Loznitsa's chilling drama explores the agonies of war and puts European history on trial
The fog of the title is the fog of war, the fog of fear and the abysmal fog of European history: it is a kind of residual pall of smoke across the field of battle – maybe it also means the obliteration brought by death itself. This is the chilling and mysterious historical parable from film-maker Sergei Loznitsa, based on the 1989 novel by the Belarusian author Vasili Bykov, resembling Elem Klimov's Come and See. (Bykov also wrote the 1970 novel The Ordeal, filmed by Larisa Shepitko as The Ascent.)
Its subject is the Nazis' invasion of the Soviet Union, and in particular the poisonous shame of collaboration that they disseminated in every part of the Reich. An important...
The fog of the title is the fog of war, the fog of fear and the abysmal fog of European history: it is a kind of residual pall of smoke across the field of battle – maybe it also means the obliteration brought by death itself. This is the chilling and mysterious historical parable from film-maker Sergei Loznitsa, based on the 1989 novel by the Belarusian author Vasili Bykov, resembling Elem Klimov's Come and See. (Bykov also wrote the 1970 novel The Ordeal, filmed by Larisa Shepitko as The Ascent.)
Its subject is the Nazis' invasion of the Soviet Union, and in particular the poisonous shame of collaboration that they disseminated in every part of the Reich. An important...
- 4/26/2013
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Although cinephiles across the globe are currently preparing themselves for the glitz and glamour of the forthcoming Cannes Film Festival, we still haven’t worked our way through the features ‘In Competition’ from last years’ event yet, one of which is the emotionally charged World War Two drama In the Fog, as Belarusian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa’s follow up to My Joy finally earns its British cinematic release.
We begin by following the harrowingly pensive walk of three partisan rebels, approaching the stage where they will soon be hanged by the Nazis currently occupying Belarus. Although the execution is a penalty for those involved in the sabotage of a train, the one man to have avoided any punishment is Sushenya (Vladimir Svirskiy). This let-off leads to accusations of him being a Nazi collaborator, and he seems to be meeting a fateful end of his own when rebels Burov (Vladislav Abashin...
We begin by following the harrowingly pensive walk of three partisan rebels, approaching the stage where they will soon be hanged by the Nazis currently occupying Belarus. Although the execution is a penalty for those involved in the sabotage of a train, the one man to have avoided any punishment is Sushenya (Vladimir Svirskiy). This let-off leads to accusations of him being a Nazi collaborator, and he seems to be meeting a fateful end of his own when rebels Burov (Vladislav Abashin...
- 4/25/2013
- by Stefan Pape
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
★★★☆☆ Ukrainian director Sergei Loznitsa returns to the London Film Festival with Cannes Palme d'Or nominee In the Fog (V tumane, 2012), a sombre wartime drama set in Belarus at the time of the Nazi occupation. The film begins with the execution of three local men, hung by the Germans for sabotage. We then move on to a night-time scene as two shadowy figures on horseback move through the woods: one, Burov (Vladislav Abashin), is in uniform and they both carry rifles. Inside a house the pair find a man carving a wooden animal for his son. He was the fourth prisoner, Sushenya (Vladimir Svirskiy), released by the Nazis under a cloud of suspicion, who the two partisans have come to shoot as a traitor.
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- 10/20/2012
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
The AFI Film Fest (11.01-11.08) have announced the line-ups for our favorite sections at the fest in the Young American selections and New Auteurs section and they’ve managed to stack up on titles that are amongst the year’s best and which in the case of two films were mysteriously passed over by the likes of Telluride, Tiff and Nyff. Michel Franco’s After Lucia (see pic above) and Antonio Campos’ Simon Killer will be making the Los Angeles premieres accompanied by the best title to come out of the Main Comp at this year’s Cannes edition in Sergei Loznitsa’s In the Fog. This trio will be joined by a trio of gems that recently premiered at Tiff in: Maja Miloš’ Clip, Gabriela Pichler’s Eat Sleep Die and Tobias Lindholm’s A Hijacking. In the Young American Selections we find some filmmakers (Sean Baker and Amy...
- 10/3/2012
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Strand Releasing has acquired all U.S. rights to Sergei Loznitsa’s “In the Fog” at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the film had an industry screening Friday. The specialty distributor plans a spring release for the film, which had its world premiere in competition at Cannes in May. Vladmir Svirski and Vlad Abashin star in a story of three men locked in moral conflict deep in a forest during World War II. Heino Deckert produced the feature, which will have its first public Tiff screening Wednesday, September 12. “The Match Factory has such an eye for quality auteur projects that we’re thrilled to be adding Mr. Loznitsa’s film to our roster,” said Strand co-president Marcus Hu. Strand co-president Jon Gerrans negotiated the deal with Brigitte Suarez of the Match Factory. Strand has recently released “Unforgivable,” “My Worst Nightmare” and “Oslo August 31st.”...
- 9/7/2012
- by Jay A. Fernandez
- Indiewire
Sergei Loznitsa's second world war drama about collaboration with the Nazis is a stark and slow-burning parable
The Ukrainian director and former documentary-maker Sergei Loznitsa scored a succès d'éstime with his first fiction feature My Joy, which was in competition in Cannes two years ago. Now he has returned with a mysterious, compelling and grim story from the Nazi-Occupied Soviet Union in 1942, shrouded in the fog of war, the fog of fear and the fathomless fog of European history – comparable, perhaps, to Elem Klimov's 1985 film Come and See.
It is a second world war story about something with which few war movies concern themselves: the banal and poisonous disgrace of collaboration that the Nazis visited on every corner of the Reich. Here former Soviet commanders put themselves eagerly at the disposal of the Nazi invader, assuming administrative duties and enforcing the new order with the usual cruelty, and...
The Ukrainian director and former documentary-maker Sergei Loznitsa scored a succès d'éstime with his first fiction feature My Joy, which was in competition in Cannes two years ago. Now he has returned with a mysterious, compelling and grim story from the Nazi-Occupied Soviet Union in 1942, shrouded in the fog of war, the fog of fear and the fathomless fog of European history – comparable, perhaps, to Elem Klimov's 1985 film Come and See.
It is a second world war story about something with which few war movies concern themselves: the banal and poisonous disgrace of collaboration that the Nazis visited on every corner of the Reich. Here former Soviet commanders put themselves eagerly at the disposal of the Nazi invader, assuming administrative duties and enforcing the new order with the usual cruelty, and...
- 5/25/2012
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
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