I look in my inbox, and there sits Damnation, a film I am amazed to discover that apparently everyone has seen but me. Apparently, since Satantango was not available for rental, most people wanted a second taste of the style shown in Werckmeister Harmonies, and this was the only one available.
The film, like Werckmeister is mostly opaque, circularly musing indirectly about Big Issues with no answers, but they keep wandering around asking. The film concerns Karrer, a heartbroken man, obsessing over memories of his former lover, who grows increasingly certain that his life, now marked by solitude and despair, has no meaning. And yes, I took that from the Netflix sleeve, because I would have been unable to give any sort of coherent summary. The thing that made Satantango as brilliant as it was to me is the fact that, despite its epic length, the film isn't too hard to figure out. It's a very grounded, straightforward tale that is not dealing with any sort of high ideals, but with the basics of life, strife and death, and because it was following mere occurrences, there was not a wasted scene, it was free to meander throughout a cast of characters, and bring out the devil in their details.
Werckmeister Harmonies is absolutely breathtaking in its visuals, but was too aloof for me, and seemed to occasionally to lack focus, with several sequences going on past their usefulness, and since I had no identification with any of the characters or their high-minded ideals, I lost interest. This same problem crops up in Damnation. I can sympathize with the plight of a heartbroken lover, but nothing in the film ever penetrated my heart. It was grim in a completely roundabout, distancing way, and so I never got inside the characters of their film.
It was sho' pretty, though.
{Grade: 7.75/10 (B/B-) / #21 (of 36) of 1988}
The film, like Werckmeister is mostly opaque, circularly musing indirectly about Big Issues with no answers, but they keep wandering around asking. The film concerns Karrer, a heartbroken man, obsessing over memories of his former lover, who grows increasingly certain that his life, now marked by solitude and despair, has no meaning. And yes, I took that from the Netflix sleeve, because I would have been unable to give any sort of coherent summary. The thing that made Satantango as brilliant as it was to me is the fact that, despite its epic length, the film isn't too hard to figure out. It's a very grounded, straightforward tale that is not dealing with any sort of high ideals, but with the basics of life, strife and death, and because it was following mere occurrences, there was not a wasted scene, it was free to meander throughout a cast of characters, and bring out the devil in their details.
Werckmeister Harmonies is absolutely breathtaking in its visuals, but was too aloof for me, and seemed to occasionally to lack focus, with several sequences going on past their usefulness, and since I had no identification with any of the characters or their high-minded ideals, I lost interest. This same problem crops up in Damnation. I can sympathize with the plight of a heartbroken lover, but nothing in the film ever penetrated my heart. It was grim in a completely roundabout, distancing way, and so I never got inside the characters of their film.
It was sho' pretty, though.
{Grade: 7.75/10 (B/B-) / #21 (of 36) of 1988}