MCMoricz
Joined Mar 2002
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Reviews14
MCMoricz's rating
I am unequivocally a Mikhalkov fan. BURNT BY THE SUN is one of the finest films I've ever seen from any director in any country. It is clearly his masterpiece to date and many of his other films are very fine indeed.
It seems unfortunate that so much controversy was generated about BARBER OF SIBERIA based on its budget. Had there not been as much money spent, there would not have been as much hollow publicity and Mikhalkov would never have generated even a fraction of the resentment that swirls around this movie from Russian people. What has clearly happened here is that after all the hoopla and expense, people were expecting something more "important", perhaps something more political or more complex and less charming. What they got was a very old-fashioned and lovely romantic film which treats the "old days" of Tsarist Russia with a forgiving and nostalgic eye.
There's no question that this film is more decidedly commercially-oriented than any other Mikhalkov film. But if in its sprawling ambition it doesn't quite have the incisive mastery of balance between beauty and intellect that earmark his best work, it still has plenty to commend it. In this film Mikhalkov seems to intend to use the pageantry of old Russia (both in terms of geography and architecture) as the backdrop to a sweet love story of warmth and humor. It's pretty much a universal story, not at all particularly innately Russian in its basic conception, but told in the context of a myriad of very idealized and elaborate images of Imperial Russia.
I can understand how a very serious-minded Russian might feel the film is too light, too forgiving of Tsarist institutions and bureaucracy, too comedic. But Russia is not only Dostoevski -- it is also Gogol or Ilf and Petrov. This film represents a certain love affair with Russia, albeit through the kind of lens a Capra or a Lubitsch gave to America in their films. It starts out as a romantic comedy set against a HUGE tapestry that emphasizes beauty over subtlety -- it deepens as it goes along, and as a result the end result eludes definition.
What it is perhaps most like (in this respect) is Welles' THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS. Huge attention to detail but a decided point-of-view to idealize the nostalgic time being explored.
And sadly, the other apt comparison to AMBERSONS is in terms of running time, as clearly it has been somewhat over-edited for commercial reasons. I've only seen the 3 hour version, but I would willingly see the 4 1/2 hour version, because I trust Mikhalkov enough to suppose that the film would be better at the greater length, as there are a few slightly disjointed or compressed transitions in the 3 hour version which no doubt reflect cuts.
What there need be no controversy about are the photography (which is stunning -- this is the most beautiful film ever shot in Russia) and the performances, especially Oleg's. It is old-fashioned movie-making of a type seldom seen these days. It is no ANDREI RUBLEV, but its heart is in a different place.
The real crime is that this film was never released in America. I saw it on the big screen in New York a few years ago thanks to a Russian film festival, and I'm grateful I had the opportunity, because it's almost like Americans were prevented from seeing it. All I can say is this: you should see this film in the theater if you have a chance. It's not Mikhalkov's finest film, but it is in certain ways his most ambitious. It is sumptuously beautiful to look at on the big screen, and even Mikhalkov not quite at his best is eminently worth the time invested. He's one of our greatest living filmmakers in the world, and you will not be wasting your time watching this film, even with its slight sense of narrative imbalance and its forgiving nostalgic glow. To most viewers it is a beautiful and endearing film.
Not every film can be as devastating as BURNT BY THE SUN. This film is more akin to the diffuse charm of Mikhalkov's DARK EYES, with that earlier film's combination of comedy and tragedy which was clearly Chekhovian. No-one expected DARK EYES to be all things to all people -- were the portraits of the local bureaucrats in that movie not gentle satires as well, and isn't that film a bit about an idealized "Russian spirit" that informs the philandering tragic character which Mastroanni plays? Certainly. But since that film didn't cost a zillion dollars like this one, no one complained about it.
Forget the budget. Just see THE BARBER OF SIBERIA and enjoy it on its own terms.
It seems unfortunate that so much controversy was generated about BARBER OF SIBERIA based on its budget. Had there not been as much money spent, there would not have been as much hollow publicity and Mikhalkov would never have generated even a fraction of the resentment that swirls around this movie from Russian people. What has clearly happened here is that after all the hoopla and expense, people were expecting something more "important", perhaps something more political or more complex and less charming. What they got was a very old-fashioned and lovely romantic film which treats the "old days" of Tsarist Russia with a forgiving and nostalgic eye.
There's no question that this film is more decidedly commercially-oriented than any other Mikhalkov film. But if in its sprawling ambition it doesn't quite have the incisive mastery of balance between beauty and intellect that earmark his best work, it still has plenty to commend it. In this film Mikhalkov seems to intend to use the pageantry of old Russia (both in terms of geography and architecture) as the backdrop to a sweet love story of warmth and humor. It's pretty much a universal story, not at all particularly innately Russian in its basic conception, but told in the context of a myriad of very idealized and elaborate images of Imperial Russia.
I can understand how a very serious-minded Russian might feel the film is too light, too forgiving of Tsarist institutions and bureaucracy, too comedic. But Russia is not only Dostoevski -- it is also Gogol or Ilf and Petrov. This film represents a certain love affair with Russia, albeit through the kind of lens a Capra or a Lubitsch gave to America in their films. It starts out as a romantic comedy set against a HUGE tapestry that emphasizes beauty over subtlety -- it deepens as it goes along, and as a result the end result eludes definition.
What it is perhaps most like (in this respect) is Welles' THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS. Huge attention to detail but a decided point-of-view to idealize the nostalgic time being explored.
And sadly, the other apt comparison to AMBERSONS is in terms of running time, as clearly it has been somewhat over-edited for commercial reasons. I've only seen the 3 hour version, but I would willingly see the 4 1/2 hour version, because I trust Mikhalkov enough to suppose that the film would be better at the greater length, as there are a few slightly disjointed or compressed transitions in the 3 hour version which no doubt reflect cuts.
What there need be no controversy about are the photography (which is stunning -- this is the most beautiful film ever shot in Russia) and the performances, especially Oleg's. It is old-fashioned movie-making of a type seldom seen these days. It is no ANDREI RUBLEV, but its heart is in a different place.
The real crime is that this film was never released in America. I saw it on the big screen in New York a few years ago thanks to a Russian film festival, and I'm grateful I had the opportunity, because it's almost like Americans were prevented from seeing it. All I can say is this: you should see this film in the theater if you have a chance. It's not Mikhalkov's finest film, but it is in certain ways his most ambitious. It is sumptuously beautiful to look at on the big screen, and even Mikhalkov not quite at his best is eminently worth the time invested. He's one of our greatest living filmmakers in the world, and you will not be wasting your time watching this film, even with its slight sense of narrative imbalance and its forgiving nostalgic glow. To most viewers it is a beautiful and endearing film.
Not every film can be as devastating as BURNT BY THE SUN. This film is more akin to the diffuse charm of Mikhalkov's DARK EYES, with that earlier film's combination of comedy and tragedy which was clearly Chekhovian. No-one expected DARK EYES to be all things to all people -- were the portraits of the local bureaucrats in that movie not gentle satires as well, and isn't that film a bit about an idealized "Russian spirit" that informs the philandering tragic character which Mastroanni plays? Certainly. But since that film didn't cost a zillion dollars like this one, no one complained about it.
Forget the budget. Just see THE BARBER OF SIBERIA and enjoy it on its own terms.
Sorry to say that despite the incredible pedigree of everyone concerned, this film was disappointing. It is beautifully shot and designed, with all the elegance and taste that one comes to expect from Merchant-Ivory, and of course the literary sensibility seems even more marked due to the scripting by Kazuo Ishiguro.
But the film is lifeless. It has plenty of aesthetic style but it has no momentum or vigor. The very accomplished performances by a truly wonderful cast are somewhat wasted when the pace is so glacial and the overall sense of film-making seems so stodgy and fatigued.
I am reminded of how frustrating I found, years ago, Merchant-Ivory's adaptation of Ishiguro's REMAINS OF THE DAY to be, despite again a stellar cast. I know there are people who would disagree strongly with me, but all the fascinating tragic interior sense of the butler's thoughts that made the book so absorbing and moving could not be communicated in a motion picture, no matter how talented an actor Anthony Hopkins is, so we wound up spending a couple of hours looking at a great actor nearly expressionless as he worked so hard to make his proper and repressed character neither register any emotions on his face nor express any in what he said.
Here again we have the same problem. There are huge emotions under the surface here, but because of the foreground sense of repression (and because of the cool-to-the-point-of-leisurely-and-moribund film-making style) we wind up watching Ralph Fiennes do his own version of Hopkins' "sorry, I can't say or feel or show anything because my character is supposed to be so repressed" act.
Granted, these are essential, trademark issues in Ishiguro's work. But it seems that without the vivid interior turmoil so eloquently expressed in his prose to help illuminate the character's stoicism, the result on screen is just....bland. Natasha Richardson fares much, much better, since her character need not be as repressed. And her performance is stunning. And John Wood makes the most out of what is essentially a TWO-LINE role(!!).
Actually, the whole Russian family is handled as a tour-de-force by the acting ensemble, and probably would have been enough to really put this picture over-the-top had not the fatally inexpressive scenes of Jackson and Matsuda ballasted the work into such a torpor. Some of this heaviness is admittedly inherent in Ishiguro's script, but I sense the very same words could have been imbued with the same gravity without nearly the somnambulent wooziness Ivory has made out of them.
I am an unabashed fan of Merchant-Ivory's work, and am saddened by the recent death of Ismail Merchant. The team of Merchant/Ivory/Ruth Prawer Jhabvala/Richard Robbins has created some real cinematic milestones. Two of the Forster adaptations are masterpieces, and many of the Indian films are rare gems. So I'm not one of those who find this dynasty to be too "artsy" or whatever other criticisms have been leveled at them by impatient filmgoers.
Yet "impatience" is indeed what I ultimately felt with this plodding execution. It was a frustrating experience, not the least because I could see how close Ivory was to achieving what he must have wanted to achieve, and how hard everyone must have worked to create that sense of Shanghai on the eve of its tragic invasion by the Japanese. It has all the elements of a great epic, but fails to become one due almost completely to the weirdly anemic sense of passionless, momentumless, drearily uninspired film-making.
But the film is lifeless. It has plenty of aesthetic style but it has no momentum or vigor. The very accomplished performances by a truly wonderful cast are somewhat wasted when the pace is so glacial and the overall sense of film-making seems so stodgy and fatigued.
I am reminded of how frustrating I found, years ago, Merchant-Ivory's adaptation of Ishiguro's REMAINS OF THE DAY to be, despite again a stellar cast. I know there are people who would disagree strongly with me, but all the fascinating tragic interior sense of the butler's thoughts that made the book so absorbing and moving could not be communicated in a motion picture, no matter how talented an actor Anthony Hopkins is, so we wound up spending a couple of hours looking at a great actor nearly expressionless as he worked so hard to make his proper and repressed character neither register any emotions on his face nor express any in what he said.
Here again we have the same problem. There are huge emotions under the surface here, but because of the foreground sense of repression (and because of the cool-to-the-point-of-leisurely-and-moribund film-making style) we wind up watching Ralph Fiennes do his own version of Hopkins' "sorry, I can't say or feel or show anything because my character is supposed to be so repressed" act.
Granted, these are essential, trademark issues in Ishiguro's work. But it seems that without the vivid interior turmoil so eloquently expressed in his prose to help illuminate the character's stoicism, the result on screen is just....bland. Natasha Richardson fares much, much better, since her character need not be as repressed. And her performance is stunning. And John Wood makes the most out of what is essentially a TWO-LINE role(!!).
Actually, the whole Russian family is handled as a tour-de-force by the acting ensemble, and probably would have been enough to really put this picture over-the-top had not the fatally inexpressive scenes of Jackson and Matsuda ballasted the work into such a torpor. Some of this heaviness is admittedly inherent in Ishiguro's script, but I sense the very same words could have been imbued with the same gravity without nearly the somnambulent wooziness Ivory has made out of them.
I am an unabashed fan of Merchant-Ivory's work, and am saddened by the recent death of Ismail Merchant. The team of Merchant/Ivory/Ruth Prawer Jhabvala/Richard Robbins has created some real cinematic milestones. Two of the Forster adaptations are masterpieces, and many of the Indian films are rare gems. So I'm not one of those who find this dynasty to be too "artsy" or whatever other criticisms have been leveled at them by impatient filmgoers.
Yet "impatience" is indeed what I ultimately felt with this plodding execution. It was a frustrating experience, not the least because I could see how close Ivory was to achieving what he must have wanted to achieve, and how hard everyone must have worked to create that sense of Shanghai on the eve of its tragic invasion by the Japanese. It has all the elements of a great epic, but fails to become one due almost completely to the weirdly anemic sense of passionless, momentumless, drearily uninspired film-making.