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The Neanderthal Man (1953)
"Whom the gods would destroy..."
This was way before PowerPoint; back then lecturers used plain old cut-and paste charts as teaching aids: The one in this film, an evolutionary brain size graphic, is liable to jump right off the screen with its inclusion of "Piltdown Man", that classic paleontological fake Missing Link that kept experts guessing for forty years. Until 1954, just after this movie was released. The hoax spawned a few films on its own, including a BBC series based on Angus Wilson's 1956 novel, "Anglo-Saxon Attitudes." In this satire the bogus bones fast forward to the Dark Ages.
By this time in the action, some viewers are likely referencing Ken Russell's 1980 "Altered States," except that in this later iteration the mad scientist is a "psycho-physiologist" who goes bobbing for atavistic apples in a sensory isolation tank. Nobel physicist Richard Feynman maintained that sessions in one of these relaxed him. Relaxation is something the William Hurt character neither seeks nor gets.
Critics generally dismiss "The Neanderthal Man" as trash, and as an aberration in E. A. DuPont's respectable career. All the same, it boasts a character-actor parade of faces you've seen many times before, but maybe not all together in one feature. These include Richard Crane as Dr. Ross Harkness, chiefly remembered as TV's space cowboy Rocky Jones. The wizened physician, William Fawcett, has too many screen credits to mention. Crazy anthropologist Clifford Groves is played by Robert Shayne; he might be best recalled as Gotham City's top cop on the 1950s "Superman" TV series. And voice actor-dialect coach Robert Easton has likely been heard more than seen.
If there's another movie that features a monster-human rape scene, it's unknown to me. Beverly Garland's character, Nola Mason was out on a picnic when she slipped into a daring (for the 'fifties) one-piece for some cheesecake poses captured by boyfriend Eric Colman's ("Buck Hastings") camera. The photo-op got the Neanderthal's attention. Buck gets his neck broken, and Nola is raped.
Euphemism straitjacket's the rape victim's lines as she's succored by the neighbors. But word travels fast. When Dr. Fairchild (William Fawcett) completes his examination of the patient, the Dr. Harkness character indulgently hopes she "won't suffer any permanent damage." All depends on what you mean by permanent. The MD replies with a non sequitur: "The shock was about as great as any woman could be asked to bear." This might leave the audience perplexed. So just to dispel all doubts, the doc hints broadly that "word of this has gotten around." And that it'd be best if the state police spotted the monster before some of the local boys do. Murdering ranchers and farmhands is one thing, but raping the local diner waitress quite another.
Nonconsensual female human-male monster coitus is rare enough, even in Hollywood. But what might follow qualifies as an event that dare not speak its name. We're talking "Rosemary's Baby." One must be grateful for a timely conclusion that doesn't explore these consequences. But, golly, talk about material for a sequel! Alas, one must be satisfied with Richard Crane reciting Sophocles at Prof. Groves' deathbed: "Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad."
Werk ohne Autor (2018)
The Germans have got us beat
This film seems to have gotten some good reviews. Why? That's the mystery. Does one learn something new? I think not. I guess it's pretty well-known that the medical profession, more than all others, played ball with the Nazi regime. This perverse opportunism in large part sustained the Nazi eugenics regime is convincingly portrayed in the first thirty minutes.
The rest is a painful display of kitsch, really bad lines, grotesque casting, and behind-the-scenes treachery. With respect to the last, it should be obvious to many theatre-goers that this is a thinly-veiled biopic of painter Gerhard Richter. Somehow the famously prudent octogenarian got snookered into buying the director's affirmations of sincerity, restraint, and accuracy, and had his old age made miserable by lies, deceit, and bad faith.
It just may be possible that some lines were purposely designed to provoke rage. Either that or laughter, I don't know which. My favorite, when the protagonist's doormat wife weeps sappy tears after a miscarriage, tells hubby that since they can't reproduce, his paintings will be their babies. I never want to hear Hollywood criticized for banal and stupid dialog again. The Germans have got us beat. Now that I think of it, it's no accident that the word "Kitsch" comes directly from the German dictionary. In fact, it has no English equivalent.
Anyone even remotely familiar with the fine arts will find Donnersmarck's depiction of art school, galleries, and "inspiration" both insulting and painful. It recalls that repulsive scene in A Beautiful Mind when the academics hand out their fountain pens to the boy genius. Equally embarrassing is the tacky sequence when the runaway couple walk into freedom when they leave the subway at Zoologischer Garten, West Berlin. The lingering closeup of the feet entering "freedom" is just too saccharine; even thirty years since reunification, it strains credulity with its Cold War cheap shot. And while I'm no fan of the East German (GDR) dictatorship, how about we acknowledge one inconvenient truth. From the time our hero was rescued from the stenciling shop by the blue collar supervisor, the dictatorship picked up the bill for ten years of training. And that included room, board, tuition, fees, materials, a stipend, health insurance, vacations (!), and a lifetime job at the end.
No six-figure loans to pay off, But there's no free lunch: The price was conformity, obedience, and unquestioned loyalty to the police state. In an austere Russian satellite like East Germany, this was a plum. And in true communist style, the hero must paint massive propaganda murals. No artistic calling, perhaps, but in the Eastern Europe of the 1950s, a choice position. The protagonist's supreme egoism and the wife's submissive compliance echo ironically the communist critique: "All you ever think of is me, me, me."
How to film a boring sex scene. How about half a dozen of them? The couple has zero chemistry and below zero electricity. Lots of female frontal nudity, but after a while it's like a nude beach; just another slice of meat. At least the participants share the spectator's ennui. In fact, the only character in the film who doesn't appear to be sleep-walking through his part is Sebastian Koch. Gee, he must have come on hard times to work on this film. This isn't unknown. Laurence Olivier and James Mason had to accept some excruciatingly bad roles for very different fiscal reasons. So, give Mr. Koch the benefit of the doubt. His is the only legitimate performance in this film, and in addition he profits from some great makeup artists and a splendidly tailored wardrobe. Still, it would be unfair to deny this actor's extraordinary talents. He carries the film and dominates every scene, but there's no way he can save it.
Opéra de Monte-Carlo: Tannhäuser (2017)
Zeal
Imagine for a moment that you're seated in one of New York City's dozen or more opera venues about a hundred and fifty years ago, waiting for the curtain to rise on Mozart's "Don Giovanni." Following the overture, the soloists perform their respective arias and recitatives, but in more than a few different native languages, English included. Such Babels of tongues were not the norm, but, according to Walt Whitman and other period sources, not exceptional. Neither were American performances of Donizetti in German, or English, or French depending on the opera house and its immigrant or native-born clientele.
Right up through the 1970s, one frequently attended performances sung in the hometown language. In Austria and Germany, Puccini was frequently sung in German. Turin and Milan mounted productions of Lohengrin in Italian; "Die Meistersinger" was presented as "I maestro cantori di Norimberga." Behind the Iron Curtain, audiences got their opera in Russian, Bulgarian, Magyar, and I don't know what else. Recordings of these mostly radio broadcasts are still to be heard, and a whole new world of expression opens up; the Russian take on Wagner is pretty special. Some years back I stumbled across a live recording of "Tannhaeuser" made in Italy during the 'sixties: Everyone, the chorus included, sings in Italian, except for Hans Beirer in the title role, who bleats out his part in his native tongue. In deference to the aging Norwegian diva Mme Flagstad who despaired of mastering the French vowels, back in the 1950s the Met ordered a quickie English translation of "Alceste's" entire libretto from the largely unheard-of John Gutman. Virgil Thompson, among other critics, declared this English-language performance a triumph. But by this time pressure from Historically Correct guardians of taste started to build.
Today, most opera companies worldwide feel obliged to determine The Original Language of the work to be performed, and vocalists need multilingual familiarity if they hope for success. But just what was The Genuine Article? Verdi, arguably the quintessential Italian composer, had more than a few of his works premiered in Paris, where, as one might expect, the Gallic tongue was de rigueur. Several of his countrymen's works were written with a French-language libretto, which was later translated into Italian. Or German: The great Verdi revival of the Weimar Republic featured "Aida" and "Il Trovatore" in German-language versions only.
These polyglot, anachronistic days are most likely gone forever. Now the purists demand that a vocal score be performed in the historically correct language. The very thought of national champions like Berlioz, Weber, or Verdi being sung in anything other than their original, correct, and certified authentic tongues makes more than one musically correct enthusiast quake with rage, embarrassment, and dread. Today's homogenized culture requires an official version of everything, so why should opera be exempted? Even if there is no definitive original.
So it's more than refreshing to see "Tannhaeuser" in French, especially since the version performed in Paris fifteen years after its premiere in Dresden had a French libretto anyway. Parisian tradition demanded a ballet, which resulted in an extended Venusberg scene and some chromatic challenges for the Love Goddess in the duet that follows. Too bad the ballet was in the wrong act; wrong for some hoodlums, anyway, who started a riot and wrecked everything. The composer, who modestly announced more than once that he was writing the Music of the Future, nursed a grudge against La Grande Nation till the day he died. It wasn't reciprocated, as "le wagnerisme" took hold in France, and the Paris version "Tannhaeuser" provoked an eloquent defense by Baudelaire. Interested listeners will profit from hearing soprano Germaine Lubin's francophone recordings of Wagner, most from the 1930s; they are sumptuous and rewarding.
How to rank the Monte Carlo offering? There's opera film, such as those directed by Zeffirerlli, and filmed opera, to which genre the Monte Carlo release belongs: As filmed opera, it's among the better achievements. No, it may not go down in musical history as one of the best ever. But it's courageous; taking risks in the arts always requires zeal. In opera, typically top-heavy with tradition, it takes nerves of steel. This release gives audiences worldwide a privileged experience: Opera sung in a semi-unofficial language, like it used to be years ago, and as such was certainly enjoyed by generations of audiences everywhere.
The Crossing (2000)
Climate Change
No one should be forbidden to earn a paycheck. This includes Jeff Daniels who must have been very short on funds to accept the title role.
Apart from repeating oodles of historical untruths, Washington's Hessian adversaries can't seem to escape the slur that they were hung-over on duty and/or caught napping. Fact is, they'd been fighting off snipers and raiders for weeks, hence were on the alert. They slept in their uniforms with loaded weapons, ready for an attack at any moment. Moreover, omitted from the script is any mention that the German recruits were shanghaied. Lots of them deserted and remained in America. But never mind, movies are about entertainment: Whoever choreographed their antics must have had a sense of humor: With that weird headgear, they pass for Keystone Cops or SNL Coneheads.
Oddly, fashion statements abound in this war movie. Colonel Rall, commanding the Germans, certainly took his time getting dressed for work. All those enemy troops storming past his bedroom window don't seem to have distracted him from getting his necktie on straight. By contrast, The American Colonel Glover is portrayed as somewhat of a fashion emergency. At the pivotal conference prior to the Battle of Trenton, he goes into some loopy rant about wigs.
After an hour and a half of goofy dialogue and low-budget props, I did manage to score a few laughs. But wait, the movie is uncannily prescient and informative: Climate Change seems to have begun in 1776. Either that or someone didn't read the history books. This film was shot up in Canada. So why isn't there any snow and ice? Wasn't that the whole thing about Trenton? The harrowing night march, the icy river, and daring assault in the dead of Winter?
Dunkirk (2017)
Brexit
Ever since its release, Dunkirk has garnered more than the usual share of column inches granted a movie in the UK press. I can only assume that it has a special resonance for the English audience. Maybe it's all tied into Brexit, and other things that many Americans don't understand.
I for one don't understand how British GIs, who'd been serially defeated by their adversaries, and had been on the run for over a month, could maintain their schoolboy haircuts and find time to shave every day. The English equivalent of Hollywood's Central Casting must have been pressed into service: The BEF appears to have been an army of heartthrobs, so much so that halfway through I figured the movie was produced with a gay audience in mind.
The retreating Brits must have had an extraordinary quartermaster, because the Tommies sport uniforms with nary a tear or a smudge. Although I can't claim any combat experience, my overall impression is that people bleed when they're shot, and that battlefields resemble smelly junkyards littered with body parts. In Christopher Nolan's vision of war, even the dead are well-groomed. One might think that following media coverage of terrorist attacks, audiences would be bemused at the sight of cadavers that looked like the undertakers had just finished getting them ready for the viewing. That PG-13 rating must require an awful lot of sanitizing.
And who, may I ask, kept the Germans at bay so the BEF could evacuate? You'd never guess it from the movie. It was the much-maligned French army; maybe even worse led than that of their ally's. Casualties were heavy among those left behind. After a particularly brutal march to Trier, Germany, survivors spent the next five years as POWs or forced laborers.
The genuine heroism of the little guys who piloted their boats across the channel is sadly rendered mawkish by wooden performances and painful clichés. And the CGI that several reviewers rave about looked to me like cartoons; in fact, the whole feature has an animated feel. Toward the end of the movie, my mind wandered, and a rogue thought conjured up memories of Rob Reiner's This is Spinal Tap, in particular the bit where narrator "Marty DiBergi" describes the faux heavy metal group as one of England's loudest bands. If there's an Oscar for decibels, then Dunkirk is a shoo-in.
Winterkinder - Die schweigende Generation (2005)
Don't Ask. Don't Tell: A courageous filmmaker investigates his family and uncovers things he maybe wished he hadn't.
Pity this documentary is only available with the German soundtrack. This understated face-to-face inquiry, in which the filmmaker questions his own family about the Nazi regime, is more telling and more enlightening than a dozen atrocity films.
Seems like Granddad is cast as the villain. One sees photos of him as a student decked out in his dueling fraternity outfit, then in his SA (Storm Trooper) uniform. His Nazi party card shows that he signed up in 1931, early enough to qualify him as a loyal and enthusiastic fascist. The legendary German passion for record-keeping yields reams of info on him; he's implicated in some pretty sordid activities in Silesia toward the end of World War II. After the war, like millions of others, he easily obtained a document that more-or-less exonerated him, and lived an unobtrusive, humdrum, small-town life until a fatal road accident in the mid-fifties.
Evidence indicates that the old man was a committed racist, a blindly obedient follower of the Fuehrer, and a willing overseer of slave labor who lived and worked within earshot of a concentration camp. He trusted fully and completely in the destiny of his fatherland, which was to subjugate Europe and dominate the world. He was dedicated to zealous fulfillment of the tasks assigned him, and drew pride and satisfaction from jobs well-done.
In a way he merits grudging respect. He was a True Believer who while complicit in murdering racial undesirables, risked his own life doing so. He doubtless benefited from his obedience and dedication, but one gets the impression that his unqualified faith in National Socialism was genuine. A war criminal? Maybe. But probably Not Guilty of opportunism. At the eleventh hour, he arranged the evacuation of his family, an act of disloyalty that cost him his party membership, and likely placed him in considerable jeopardy. By contrast, his daughter and grandchildren appear far more ominous and, oddly enough, guilty.
Mom is a vapid, impassive, chubby senior who never discussed much with anybody. While she admits that walking past a huge pile of burning corpses as a twelve-year-old made an impression, it was just a case of "don't ask, don't tell." Confronted with the grisly evidence, she displays virtually no emotion; neither grief, nor regret, nor even curiosity. The grandchildren --the director's sisters -- are at once uncanny and repulsive. They iron, vacuum, sew, and endlessly gripe and complain about their own narrow, petty, selfish concerns without the slightest indication of pity for the victims. Dad is a henpecked, browbeaten little guy who's too busy gluing together homemade Christmas ornaments to respond to the interview. Yet all five agreed to be interviewed and filmed.
One sister refused to participate. I got the impression she was the eldest. A brief glimpse of her at the end sends the viewer a cryptic, sinister message.
Kabale und Liebe (1959)
Friedrich Schiller, via the (former) German Democratic Republic
Adapting a stage play for the screen is by nature a risky enterprise. Most of them are failures. Viewers of "Kabale und Liebe" ("Love and Intrigue") won't be disappointed.
Otto Mellies is pretty convincing as the young, tragic, romantic hero. Karola Ebeling's performance as Luise could be criticized as weak and sappy, but that's precisely who she's supposed to be; a submissive, obedient only child in a small town patriarchal family over two centuries ago. Wolf Kaiser, who plays President von Walther, steals every scene he's in. When he invites himself into the Miller household, and proceeds to call Luise a whore and her Dad a pimp, he brings it off with a dismissive and convincing flourish. The scene where he smashes the mirror could easily have failed, but he brings it off. His secretary is aptly named "Worm": He's the classic parvenu, opportunistic yes-man of German literature, brilliantly depicted by novelist Heinrich Mann in "Der Untertan." Jens-Uwe Pape gives this potentially cardboard character impressive subtlety; he becomes The Man You Love To Hate. Willi Schwabe chatters von Kalb's lines like a frenchified caricature of aristocratic decadence. I didn't get this from reading the play, but I think Schwabe's long suit was comedy, anyway. Marion Van de Kamp is an exquisite Lady Milford: She makes her somewhat contrived hard luck story sound believable, and her scene with the jewels and the old servant is memorable. The small roles of the petty, rather stupid mother, and the eager-to-please maid are handled with competence and professionalism by Marianne Wuenscher and Christine Schwarze, respectively.
The only disappointment was Martin Hellberg as Miller. He overacts, raises his voice in the wrong places, and appears pretty unsympathetic. Maybe this is because he directed the movie, too. In any case, I thought his interpretation heavy-handed.
I wish I knew where this was filmed. It was done on location, somewhere, and the whole effect is tasteful, convincing, and moody. It doesn't have that Colonial Williamsburg look that so many films set in this period, both European and America, find it hard to avoid.
American audiences might find resonance in the scenes where the townspeople and farmers are dragged off to the army by press gangs. This was a growth industry in Germany at the time. It financed high-end lifestyles for the princes, some of whom got extra cash if their soldiers-of-misfortune got killed. That's what paid for Lady Milford's diamonds. Some of this unlucky cannon-fodder ended up fighting the American colonists when the British ran short of personnel: These were the Hessians, so called because most of them came from Hesse-Nassau. The contractor, Landgrave William IX, became one of the richest men in Europe, and gave Mayer Rothschild his start in the banking business.
This version of "Kabale und Liebe" was filmed in the former German Democratic Republic, better known to Americans as East Germany. Maybe this is why the class conflict themes in the play are written so large. And the scene where the shanghaied troopers are shot after their failed mutiny is pretty powerful.
By the way, this seems to have been the cinematic finale for most of the cast. With one or two exceptions, they seem to have dropped out of acting altogether, or removed permanently to the small screen to do cop shows.
I viewed this on a region free DVD-player. The disc had no subtitles. My German is far from perfect, so anyone who's familiar with the play, and who has a working knowledge of the language, will likely enjoy this film. And Schiller, who really endured a lot of humiliation, persecution, and worse, in the courts of German princes, would, I think, approve of Hellberg's version.