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This is an English-language release.
Superstar genetic engineers Clive (Adrien Brody) and Elsa (Sarah Polley) specialize in splicing DNA from different animals to create incredible new hybrids. Now they want to use human DNA in a hybrid that could revolutionize science and medicine. But when the pharmaceutical company that funds their research forbids it, Clive and Elsa secretly take their boldest experimentation underground - risking their careers by pushing the boundaries of science to serve their own curiosity and ambition.
The result is Dren, an amazing, strangely beautiful creature of uncommon intelligence, and an array of unexpected physical developments. At first, Dren exceeds their wildest dreams. But as she grows and learns at an accelerated rate, her existence threatens to become their worst nightmare.
Film: Splice
Release date: 29th November 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 104 mins
Director: Vincenzo Natali
Starring: Adrien Brody, Sarah Polley, Delphine Chaneac, Brandon McGibbon, Simona Maicanescu
Genre: Drama/Sci-Fi/Thriller
Studio: Optimum
Format: DVD & Blu-ray
Country: Canada/France/USA
Film: Metropolis
Release date: 22nd November 2010
Certificate: PG
Running time: 150 mins
Director: Fritz Lang
Starring: Alfred Abel, Gustav Fröhlich, Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Fritz Rasp, Theodor Loos
Genre: Action/Adventure/Drama/Romance/Sci-Fi/Thriller
Studio: Eureka!
Format: DVD & Blu-ray
Country: Germany
Considered by many for over eighty years to be the Holy Grail of lost films, the missing 25-minutes of the original version of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis has finally been found. The Austrian-born director’s 1927 tour de force has been fully restored and can now be seen in all its retro-style glory, just as Lang originally intended.
Metropolis is set in a futuristic city and tells the story of a down-trodden work-force being controlled by an industrial magnate called Joh Fredersen (Alfred Abel). The workers live and toil underground in harsh conditions, whilst the privileged high castes enjoy a luxurious life in the city above.
Fredersen’s cosseted son, Freder (Gustav Frolich), falls in love with the righteous Maria (Brigitte Helm) after she visits the Eternal Gardens with a group of children from the Lower City. Freder goes looking for the girl and is soon exposed to the horrendous state of affairs the workers are made to endure, and takes the place of a labourer who works a ten-hour shift working the hands of a giant clock machine.
Learning that Rotwang (Rudolf Klein-Rogge) has created a female robot as a replacement to their mutual lost lover Hel, Fredersen instructs the mad inventor to transform her into an evil double of Maria, whom Fredersen now sees as a threat, as she prophesises the coming of a ‘Mediator’ who will liberate the oppressed workers and their children, and to let her loose in the underworld…
The newly found footage, which was discovered in 2008 in Buenos Aires, now gives merit to the subplots that are woven into the script, written by Lang and his then-wife Thea Von Harbou, such as the rivalry between Rotwang and Fredersen over their past shared love for Hel, who died giving birth to her son Freder. It also restores the importance of the character Der Schmale (Fritz Rasp), the sinister assistant to Fredersen, whose limited scenes in the re-edited version made him appear insignificant.
With a quarter of the film reinstated, Metropolis can be seen as an epic film of many battles - religion against science, man against machine, liberation against oppression, and good against evil – and poses many questions, such as should man play at being God? Nowhere in the film is this question more apparent than in the scene where Rotwang transforms his metallic creation into the likeness of Maria, a scene that could have taken reference from the biblical story of Creation: “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness, and let them rule over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” However, once Rotwang starts to play God, all hell breaks loose and results in a ‘big flood’.
The film is rife with religious symbolism, such as the Star of David located on the wall behind the seated robot as it is being transformed into the likeness of Maria; the Tower of Babel where Fredersen rules over the workers of the underworld; the prophecy of an apocalypse made by a monk during a sermon; the seven deadly sins sequence; and, most noticeably, the character of Maria who represents angelic and compassionate qualities resembling those of the Virgin Mary.
The film also oozes eroticism - the robot’s hour-glass figure and graceful strut resembles that of a catwalk model; and Maria’s sexual magnetism and seductive prowess over the powerless hot-blooded men of the Eternal Garden who are left mesmerised by her hypnotic sensual dance performance.
Its magnificent visuals consisting of striking towering city blocks, inspired by the skyscrapers of New York, which he witnessed during his trip to America in 1924, still captivates film-lovers to this day. It has been reported that Lang was never satisfied with the filming of Metropolis unless he had three good takes of every shot, leading to extreme rehearsals and exhaustion within the actors. Although she was a newcomer to the acting world, Helm proved her worth by playing both the empathetic Maria and the seductive Maria convincingly. But she admitted at the time that the water sequences for the flooding scenes were a strain on her health, as was the wearing of the robot suit. Clamped in her wooden armament, made from malleable wood material which had just appeared on the market, Helm suffered from lack of air due to the shot taking so long.
Shortly after its premier, the film, which ran at a little under two-and-a-half hours, was considered far too long for American audiences and thus was savagely re-edited, much to Lang’s disgust, resulting in the storyline making little sense at all. The film was a major flop for the studio, and being the most expensive film ever made, at that time, it almost brought UFA to its knees. However, the film has built up a cult following over the years, and has gained the respect it so rightly deserves. And more than eighty years after its original release, Metropolis continues to mesmerise audiences and be an influence on contemporary filmmaking, a testament to Lang’s genius as a visionary.
The words groundbreaking, timeless, classic and masterpiece are shamelessly over-used in film critique, making them almost clichés. But these are words that accurately describe this work of cinematic art. There’s no denying, especially now that it can be seen in its entirety, as Lang intended, that Metropolis is the most important film of its genre, and undoubtedly one of the greatest films ever made. SLP
Film: Metropolis
Release date: 10th September 2010
Certificate: PG
Running time: 150 mins
Director: Fritz Lang
Starring: Alfred Abel, Gustav Fröhlich, Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Fritz Rasp, Theodor Loos
Genre: Action/Adventure/Drama/Romance/Sci-Fi/Thriller
Studio: Eureka!
Format: Cinema
Country: Germany
This iconic film of German cinema has not been seen in its entirety since initial screenings in Germany in early 1927, after which more than a quarter of the film was cut for its release the same year in America. The deleted footage was believed permanently lost until the discovery in 2008 of a duplicate negative of the film in Argentina. This new release follows restoration of the film carried out by the FW Murnau Foundation in Germany, with an additional 25 minutes of footage bringing a greater coherence to director Fritz Lang’s dystopian vision of the future.
In the year 2027, the city of Metropolis is divided between the upper world of the privileged, an Art Deco city of arrogantly looming skyscrapers, futuristic skyways, dazzling lights and decadent nightclubs, and a dark and cavernous underworld populated by workers whose lives are fodder for the barbaric machine lying at the heart of the superficially civilised city.
The central character, Freder (Gustav Fröhlich), is the son of the city’s architect and mastermind, Joh Fredersen (Alfred Abel). Freder’s life of decadence is shaken by the intrusion of a worker from the underworld, Maria (Brigitte Helm), into the city’s pleasure gardens. When Freder follows Maria back to the caverns of the machines, he unearths the monstrous reality of the city’s industrial heart. His discovery that something is rotten in the state of Metropolis leads him to confront his father and to go in search of Maria and, ultimately, some resolution between the master race above and the slaves below.
The city is thrown into further disarray by the robot created by the mad inventor, Rotwang (Rudolf Klein-Rogge). When Joh Fredersen witnesses Maria preaching to the workers, he fears that she may cause them to rise up against their masters, and so urges Rotwang to give the robot Maria’s features in order to sow distrust and discord among the workers.
Once the robot Maria is unleashed upon the city, like the biblical whore of Babylon, then all semblance of civilisation begins to break down. It is up to Freder to effect reconciliation between the upper and lower worlds (“the mediator between the head and the hands must be the heart”) and save Metropolis from destruction…
The film earned its legendary status through the gigantic ambitions of its set designs, technical innovations and grand social and moral themes. Production infamously went wildly over budget, with its initially estimated cost of 1.5 million marks coming closer to 6 million, taking a virtually unprecedented shooting time of nine months. Typically of German cinema of the time, it was filmed entirely within the controlled conditions of UFA’s massive studios, enabling meticulous artistic control of the film’s design. Many technical innovations were used, such as multiple exposure of the film negative to create compound images, and the use of mirrors to include scaled model sets within the same shot as real action. Despite the primitive nature of these techniques compared to the sophistication of CGI, they remain surprisingly effective – for example, the scene where Rotwang’s robot comes to life, turns slowly towards Fredersen and extends a hand towards him creates a genuine thrill and sense of unease.
The main effect of the additional footage is the greater prominence given to Freder’s relationships with three supporting male characters, who were reduced to extras in the cut version. Freder is shown to be capable of inspiring devoted loyalty from both his father’s former overseer, Josaphat (Theodor Loos), and from the downtrodden worker known as 11811 (Erwin Biswanger). The sinister Thin Man (Fritz Rasp) is sent by Joh Fredersen to spy on his son, his ruthlessness indicating the lengths to which the father will go to protect his inequitable empire. The fleshing out of these three characters’ relationships with Freder gives greater depth to his characterisation, and he appears more dynamic and heroic than in the truncated version of the film.
The ideology of Metropolis has created much debate concerning the film’s political stance. As the workers shuffle towards their morning shift, their rounded backs recall the stylised torsos of Soviet propaganda posters, but the heads of the workers are abjectly bowed rather than raised in pride. The proletariat seems alarmingly bendable to the will of others – whether to the impassioned, quasi-religious pleas of Maria, asking the workers to keep faith in the long awaited Mediator, who will bring social harmony to Metropolis; or to the demented sexual promise of the robot Maria, inciting the workers to revolt, to the musical accompaniment of an off-key Marsellaise. The workers trudge towards revolution with as much apparent mindlessness as they manifested in the drudgery of their working day. But the film seems to portray the privileged classes as equally powerless with regard to their own destiny. Even the path of Freder is touched by the fatalism characteristic of Lang’s films. Freder’s moral disgust, compassion for his fellow man, romantic love for Maria and rebellion against the city’s patriarch cast him in the role of a modern day Hamlet. His pre-figured destiny is not to heal the wounds of that society, but to effect a superficial reconciliation which merely casts a sentimental glow over the class divide.
The political equivocation of the film is mirrored by the ambiguity of its modernist set design, expressing both repulsion and fascination with the machine age. This ambiguity reflects the mood of the era, when the mechanised destruction of the Great War and the subsequent economic collapse of Germany contributed to modernism being fêted by violently opposing political and artistic groups. It’s therefore not surprising that the modernist aesthetics of Metropolis have led critics to make wildly varying judgements concerning Lang’s political intentions. The film’s resistance to definitive interpretation has only added to its status and fascination for generations of cinema viewers.
The restored footage gives modern audiences the chance to appreciate Lang’s vision as never before. Experience the full exhilaration of the film’s majestically soaring sets, dramatic music score and startling visual effects, and its larger than life performances, from Freder’s anguished moral indignation to Brigitte Helm’s magnificently twitching and demented portrayal of the evil robot. KR
Film: Black Lightning
Release date: 6th September 2010
Certificate: PG
Running time: 101 mins
Director: Dmitriy Kiselev & Aleksandr Voytinskiy
Starring: Grigoriy Dobrygin, Ekaterina Vilkova, Viktor Verzhbitskiy, Valeriy Zolotukhin, Ekaterina Vasileva
Genre: Action/Family/Sci-Fi
Studio: Universal
Format: DVD & Blu-ray
Country: Russia
Black Lightning is your 'typical' story of an ordinary boy, who is given an incredible flying car for his birthday. He then uses the car to become rich in order to win the heart of a girl, but becomes embroiled in a fiendish plot which could end up destroying Moscow!
Dima (Dobrygin) is the kind of boy no-one at school remembers - poor and clever - whilst his best friend is the richest and most popular boy in school.
Dima comes from a normal, down to earth family. His father is a man who believes that nothing in life matters as much as being a good person and doing the right thing, values he has tried to instil in his son. Dima is jealous of his rich friend Max who has the best clothes, the best gadgets, the best car, and, most importantly, the beautiful new girl from their Economics class.
Everything changes for Dima when he is given an old Volka car for his birthday. Ashamed at first, he may have been dreaming of a Mercedes-Benz, but never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined taking possession of the incredible car which will change his life completely.
Will Dima use his new flying car to gain wealth and success, and win the heart of the beautiful Nastya? Or will he use the car for the greater good and prevent the evil Kuptsov’s (Verzhbitskiy) plans which could see Moscow literally sinking into the Earth?
The first thing to notice about Black Lightning is that the look and tone of the film bears more than a passing resemblance to Day Watch and Night Watch. Black Lightning co-director Dmitriy Kiselev was an editor and second unit director on the aforementioned films, as well helping out with Bekmambetov’s Wanted, and the trademark car chases, slow-motion sequences, and non-Hollywood special effects are all well to the fore here. And it is a very good thing Black Lightning is so well made, because there are many familiar story elements and plot devices - Black Lightning not only wears its heart on its sleeve, it wears its derivatives on its forehead. However, Black Lightning is an enjoyable romp, so it’s not surprising a Hollywood re-make has already been mooted (with Bekmambetov rumoured to helm).
Grigoriy Dobrygin gives Dima the necessary pathos in the now familiar Peter Parker-esque role, although the paucity of his family life is illustrated without the need for clunky dialogue, which is way more successful than the Spiderman films. If there are any complaints, it is that the short run time doesn’t allow Dima an entirely believable character arc. It’s a bit rushed, but for a film aimed at the family, this is a minor quibble.
A larger quibble is that Dima’s character IS Peter Parker without the spider bite! Even his character transition is sparked by an event taken directly from the Spiderman back story, which is a shame, because Grigoriy Dobrygin’s performance may not be recognised due to the startling lack of imagination in Dima’s characterisation.
Also, as in Spiderman, Black Lightning is really a story about a girl, in this case the beautiful Ekaterina Vilkova. She plays Nastya; love interest, object of desire, and reason for Dima’s transition from nice guy nobody to selfish high-flyer. The love triangle between Nastya, Dima and Max is surprisingly well played, and it’s impossible not to really root for our heroes.
Where Black Lightning differs from other superhero films is that the real star of the show is the car. Dima’s ancient black Volka is a thing of real beauty, and the rather silly premise which enables the car to fly is good fun. Watching the car zooming above the streets of Moscow via the impressive effects is exhilarating, and there is a decent success rate for the visual gags.
Another of the features shared with Day Watch is the supporting cast, and amongst the familiar faces is the excellent Viktor Verzhbitskiy playing bad guy Kupstov. During the first third of the film, Kupstov’s relationship with Dima is especially rewarding as Dima’s moral compass is shifted by the magnetic presence of his charismatic mentor. Unfortunately, much of the good work is undone as the tension is lost when the film movie towards its cartoony climax. Saying that, we are treated to the sight of three elderly scientists being tied to a giant drill which is being used to mine underneath the streets of Moscow, as well as a flying Mercedes which bears more than a passing resemblance to a certain flying Delorean, so it’s not all bad!
Black Lightning is fun for kids of all ages, although the very young may not be able to keep up. If young children don’t like the subtitles, the dubbing is pretty good, with annoying voices kept to a minimum. The performances are decent, the story is well paced and the action is interspersed at regular intervals throughout. Even if you don’t become totally involved with the film, you can enjoy yourself spotting which script ideas have been taken from other films. SM
Film: Cargo
Release date: 5th July 2010
Certificate: 12
Running time: 107 mins
Director: Ivan Engler & Ralph Etter
Starring: Anna-Katherina Scwabroh, Martin Rapold, Regula Grauwiller, Yangzom Brauen, Pierre Semmler
Genre: Sci-Fi/Mystery/Thriller/Horror
Studio: Optimum
Format: DVD & Blu-ray
Country: Switzerland
Switzerland’s first attempt at sci-fi, and Ivan Engler’s first feature film, Cargo harks back to numerous icons of science fiction cinema – everything from The Thing to The Matrix, and, most notably, Ridley Scott’s Alien. It belongs to that particular breed of dystopian science fiction – where the world is ruined and the human race is living on borrowed time.
The film opens with Dr Laura Portmann (Anna Katharina Schwabroh) joining the crew of The Kassandra, a cargo transportation ship that is set to make a journey to the distant Station 42. Laura intends to make enough money to join her family on the planet Rhea - humanity’s last hope after Earth is left uninhabitable – by 2267. The people of Earth have been forced to flee their home planet and now live aboard cramped space stations rife with disease, famine and fear until they can be resettled.
After boarding the cargo vessel, Dr Portman is briefly introduced to the rest of the crew. There’s the old and grizzled Captain Lacroix (Pierre Semmler), the by-the-book second officer Lindbergh (Regula Grauwiller), a double-act of engineers Vespucci and Prokoff (Michel Finger and Claude-Oliver Rudolph), Yoshida the computer expert (Yangzom Brauen) and the mysterious Decker (Martin Rapold) – the security escort hired after a recent bout of terrorist attacks. All are put into cryo-sleep for the journey. Each crew member is awake for an eight month shift of the journey to maintain the vessel and cargo, and it is during Laura’s shift that strange things begin to happen. There are odd noises on the seemingly deserted ship, and something appears to be moving in the cargo hold. She wakes the Captain and Decker and they investigate.
When Captain Lacroix mysteriously falls to his death while investigating the cargo hold, the rest of the crew are woken to decide on their next move. Suspicions arise about their cargo and their true mission. Both Decker and Lindbergh look like they are hiding something. What is the cargo they are transporting and why? And are the crew really alone on the Kassandra?
Cargo is visually impressive for a film with a reported €4.2 million budget. The very first thing we see is a glittering space station hanging in low orbit of a colossal planet, we then zoom right through a window in the side of the station. Here, we are taken inside, and we feel part of the cramped, squalid conditions of a ‘space refugee camp’. The film is no less impressive when onboard the Kassandra, the corridors are all Ridley Scott-esque industrial piping shrouded in shadow, and the vast cargo hold looms ominously like a mechanical cathedral – you could scarcely get more creepily atmospheric locations.
Despite the visuals and the promising start to the story, Cargo has its problems. The most annoying thing about the film is how it seems to have given into the pressure of audience expectations of a sci-fi film – it’s got the opportunity to be inventive, but is actually not very different to a typical Hollywood film. The crew is made up of all the usual character archetypes you find in every American sci-fi: we have the stiff and regimental officers, the smart-ass engineers and the computer expert of Asian ethnicity. Even the character of Laura is a little too close to Ripley of the Alien series (they both go on a similar character arc, starting fairly meek and quiet, before becoming independent heroines).
The first half of the film builds tension very effectively, and shocking revelations are promised from the start – we desperately want to find out what the crew are transporting and why, and what Decker’s secret agenda is. Unfortunately, when the truth is finally revealed, it’s a bit of an anticlimax, even if it does offer some nice emotional beats. We’ve seen it all before. The plot itself also meanders, and is a little incoherent in the final 20 minutes or so.
Cargo is a competent sci-fi, but it’s nothing special. The first half is effectively tense and engaging, but it loses its way towards the end. Visually stunning considering the budget, but unfortunately, it’s nowhere near original or creative enough to be considered a particularly revolutionary sci-fi film. SSP
Film: Hinokio: Inter Galactic Love
Running time: 111 mins
Director: Takahiko Akiyama
Starring: Masatoshi Nakamura, Kanata Hongo, Mikako Tabe
Genre: Sci-Fi/Drama
Country: Japan
Not released in the UK.
With the recent success of Mostow’s Surrogates, and the unparalleled reception of Cameron’s Avatar, the concept of a surrogate existence outside of a human form has been reintroduced cinematically to a Western audience. Prior to this, in 2005, Akiyama released Hinokio, a farsighted film which posed the apt question: can you live your life through technology?
Satoru is an isolated 11-year-old boy. Confined to a wheelchair after a serious car crash, which killed his mother, he refuses to leave his room. His father, a robotics manufacturer, creates for him a robot, which he can control and communicate through via a station in his room. The purpose of this robot is that Satoru might go to school again and have some semblance of a life - albeit through robotic lenses.
As Satoru (Hongo) starts piloting his new robot - nicknamed by his fellow students ‘Hinokio’ due to the Hinoki cyprus wood which makes up part of its structure, and the similarity of the circumstances to Pinocchio - he soon begins to make friends in unusual ways, and experience life again through the safety and distance of the robot, even interacting - even if bitterly - with his father Kaoru (Nakamura), whom he hasn’t spoken to since his mother’s death a year previously.
As the film progresses, and love blossoms with tomboy Jun, Satoru must decide if his motives for remaining hidden behind the robot are valid or if they are driven by fear…
Hinokio was Akiyama’s directorial debut, with his career up to this point spent as a visual art director for well known richly visual work like Final Fantasy. His previous award-winning experience in visual effects served him well, as Hinokio benefits enormously from his eye for detail. Being both screenwriter and director it is understandable that Akiyama’s grounding in visual, and primarily computer game graphics would be part of the movie. The subplot of the movie is the effect of the mysterious, all consuming role play video game Purgatory, which simultaneously adds and detracts from the film. Its addition gives well thought out sequences of graphics, yet, at the same time, detracts from an insightful and poignant story with unnecessary plot convolutions. It seemed as if Akiyama’s use of the game was a way to add action into a film that didn’t need it.
The direction, though, is creative and inspired. Akiyama’s use of Hinokio’s perspective throughout portions of his scenes brings the audience a more intimate view of Saturo’s life. Shooting through a fish-eye lens to give the view through the robot’s eyes takes the viewer out of the filmic moment and instead into a computer simulation. The lenses give a considerably more vibrant colour than the ‘real’ world outside of them. The contrast when the camera goes back to the wide shot is enhanced by the grey tones which are utilised. Akiyama’s direction focuses very much on point of view shots of Saturo and Hinokio, often positioning cameras behind the robot and over-the-shoulder to allow an enhanced awareness of the reaction of his fellow pupils, or a perspective on the physical difference between Hinokio and its classmates.
Visually the cinematography is exceptional, creating overwhelmingly complicated and rewarding shot sequences and making use of captivating light. There is one particularly beautiful scene between Hinokio and Saturo’s father who has come to fix him. The poignant scene as Saturo speaks of his feelings to his father through Hinokio for the first time in a year takes place in front of a burning sunset, which moves, systematically obscuring and revealing the characters causing them to be illuminated with the dying light.
The sound of the film is split between the upbeat pop songs which accompany Hinokio’s escapades and the stark diagetic sound which accompanies forays into Saturo’s home. His wheelchair moving, the sound of typing and the fridge opening is often the only sound which accompanies the deafening silence. Choosing not to speak, his messages to his father are relayed in notes he leaves outside of the door, despite Kaoru imploring Saturo to communicate with him. The contrast between the two different uses of sound contrasts well - it emphasises the imposed solitude Saturo has chosen for himself, and the joy of his new friendships as he uses Hinokio.
The performances are well considered. With such a young cast there is often a tendency to overact yet they are very restrained. Hongo’s performance of the often expressionless Saturo is captivating. It is possible to feel the hopelessness of the character that has imposed his own hikikomori in his bedroom. A special mention must be given to Nakamura, whose depiction of Kaoru - the father unable to break his son’s isolated captivity - is superb.
Released a year after Facebook, a year after the current prolific incarnation of World Of Warcraft, and two years after Second Life, the film taps into an audience who are already utilising their own avatars in their technological lives. The repeated mention of ‘Purgatory’, and its drug like influence on some of the children who disappear for days to play it, and the references to the suspension of the soul both in the game and outside of it, points to a larger message Akiyama is relaying.
Hinokio, although aimed at children and young people, raises a point which is applicable to all watchers, even with the advances in technology - there is no substitute for human interaction. Conversely it took a robot to fully emphasise the power of humanity.
It is hard to believe Hinokio is Akiyama’s directorial debut. It is a beautiful, poignantly executed work which celebrates life as much as it deals with death. A story which is full of heart, even if it is robotic. DHA
Series: World On A Wire
Release date: 17th May 2010
Certificate: U
Running time: 204 mins
Director: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Starring: Klaus Löwitsch, Barbara Valentin
Genre: Sci-Fi/Crime
Studio: Second Sight
Format: DVD
Country: Germany
World on A Wire has rarely been seen outside of its native Germany, yet with recognition of its influence on the likes of David Cronenberg and The Matrix, the two-part feature-length series has being awarded a more general release in the UK, over thirty years after its original television debut.
It is the near-future, and Dr. Stiller is in charge of The Simulacron, a virtual reality machine which contains a fully functioning universe - an entire population of living projections existing within the confines of one supercomputer. The inhabitants of this reality have complete freewill, and are none the wiser to the true nature of their lives.
However, in the real world strange things are happening. Dr. Vollmer, one of the original creators of the machine, is found dead. Not long after this, one of Dr. Stiller’s co-workers Gunther Lause disappears mid-conversation, and is seemingly wiped from collective memory. The problem is Dr. Stiller remembers, and is perceived by all around him to be slowly going insane.
When one of the virtual-reality creations escapes from the computer and into the real world, it begins a chain of events that sees Dr. Stiller arrive at the realisation that the lines between the real and the non real are not as concrete as first assumed...
This plot will seem familiar to any fan of modern science-fiction; however, this is an atmospheric and visually inventive film that delves into the theories of ‘reality as projection’ with a straight-faced seriousness, negating the use of cheap post-modernism and knowing irony. What begins as a noir-ish crime investigation becomes a more interesting investigation into the nature of identity, memory, reality and the strange role that cinema plays in defining the above.
Fassbinder’s World On A Wire is a knowing un-reality, a Bretchian display of construction, which suits the plot perfectly. Long tracking shots are interspersed with strange high and low angles. Bunsen burners are held under the camera so the picture warps and swirls, the lighting subtly morphs during scenes, casting strange shadows and nauseating movement. In this way, the ‘reality’ in which this story exists (the filmic reality) is shown to be a construction, much like the world of The Simulacron.
By way of its self-referential visual flair, we as an audience are never allowed the comfort of ‘cinema as escapism’; we are forced to de-construct the film, and more disturbingly, the world around us. To further this point, the mise-en-scène is populated with falsities, versions of ourselves which, while convincing, are merely the projections of our egos onto the inanimate. This is a world of mirrors, statues, paintings and shop mannequins, wrapped in celluloid and projected onto our television screens.
While this could have so easily descended into the realm of ponderous debate, World On A Wire is in fact an engrossing thriller. Klaus Lowitsch’s performance as Dr. Fred Stiller allows us a believable, and more importantly likeable hero who shares our confusion and dismay as the world around him unfurls, becoming nothing short of a suffocating nightmare. The pacing keeps the element of chase and danger prominent, while allowing for the more cerebral elements to come through, a trick that was sadly lacking from the similar, but lesser-quality, Matrix sequels.
The use of music in the film is another way in which the tension is allowed to build. The soundtrack is one which shifts from beautiful classical to Krautrock sirens and electronic noise - a shifting which happens with alarming regularity and speed. Combining a disorientating use of camera with a disconcerting soundtrack, World on A Wire creates a fully immersive audio/visual experience.
Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s dystopian fantasy explores the link between perception and reality by dismantling the constructive nature of film. Its view of the future will seem dated, and its plot will cause many a viewer to experience strong déjà-vu, but World On A Wire goes deeper then it’s modern re-hashes, and will inspire many an audience member to join in the philosophical debate. AC
Film: Casshern
Release date: 10th April 2006
Certificate: 15
Running time: 142 mins
Director: Kazuaki Kiriya
Starring: Yusuke Iseya, Kumiko Aso, Toshiaki Karasawa, Akira Terao, Kanako Higuchi
Genre: Sci-Fi/Action/Drama
Studio: Momentum
Format: DVD
Country: Japan
One could reasonably assume that with such a talented cast on show, and a frankly stunning amount of effort put into imbuing the film with an original aesthetic, there seemed little scope for Kazuaki Kiriya's directorial debut (and a production debut for the Casshern Film Partners) to do anything but garner mass critical acclaim. So what went wrong?
Set in a 1984-esque future, where the world is divided into various super-states that are constantly at war with one another, Casshern focuses on the lives of a father and son. The father, Kotaro (Akira Terao) – as one of the leading scientists in the Eastern Federation – is obsessed with cracking the code to neo-cell (read: synthetic human) technology, ostensibly to help his country, but in reality it’s because his wife is terminally ill and can only be saved through such a breakthrough. Meanwhile the son, Tetsuya (Yusuke Iseya), is away fighting for the Eastern Federation in a conflict with Europa that has lasted fifty years.
The film takes its first turn when Tetsuya is killed in action and Kotaro, overcome with grief, submerges him in the neo-cell gene-mix in the vain hope of resurrecting him. What in actual fact happens is the rebirth of 'Legendary Hero' Casshern through Tetsuya's body, and the subsequent creation of a race of rogue androids through the neo-cell mixture, calling themselves Bio-Roids and led by the fearsome Burai (Toshiaki Karasawa). So far, so cool then.
Supplementing the main storyline is the bratty-but-smart son of the Eastern Federation's Head of State, and heir to his throne, Kaoru (Mitsuhiro Oikawa), a man whose aim is to usurp his father and establish 'The Fed' as the leading global power through any means. You've seen this type of chap before: he's borderline Machiavellian and classical in his composition as a character.
Notwithstanding, on the other side of the fence we have the innocent Luna (Kumiko Aso): Tetsuya's girlfriend and a character around which much of the protagonist's story revolves, even if she rarely has an impact herself.
The story follows this group of characters as they attempt to hunt down, negotiate with, avoid or utilise Burai and his Bio-Roids but, as the story develops, it becomes clear that these beings - wrought as they were by human hands - do not wish to involve themselves in human affairs, unless by 'involve' you mean 'obliterate entirely'…
Casshern is undoubtedly pretty. Not in the sense that Avatar is visually stunning, more in the sense that it has such a bold and striking aesthetic that it is impossible to mistake the film for anything else. The seamless blend of almost anime-like backdrops and marching robot armies with live-action fight sequences is stunning, and the way these are complimented by impressive special effects and character and set design that is frequently jaw-dropping only adds to that experience.
However looking great does not a movie make, and there are problems beneath Casshern's shiny surface - the main bone of contention being that the film’s ambition in presenting an over-arcing aesthetic and a vibrant world for the plot to take place within is also its greatest drawback. Too often it performs leaps of faith from scene to scene as it attempts to cram two or three films worth of substance into a 142 minute running time. There is just so much going on that it often leaves the viewer behind in an attempt to fit everything in, and this frequently leads to apathy, unable to get to grips with what’s happening.
The acting is solid (at times very good - Karasawa and Oikawa's performances are both brilliant), but there's little scope for anyone to perform because of how frequently Casshern attempts to encapsulate literally everything that is going on within the world. There is political intrigue and upheaval, a love story, a tale of a husband’s love for his wife - and that same man's deteriorating relationship with his son. It is, quite frankly, too much for one film.
As something to just sit back and watch it really is entertaining: the design is good enough to cover for unexplained elements of the plot and the action sequences are pretty much constantly stunning, but there feels like there's so little substance behind what's happening that it's difficult to fully recommend Casshern, despite the areas in which it excels – notably in the action and sci-fi – because it lacks drama. Drama is certainly attempted, but none of the characters get enough screen time to ever gain any real empathy from the viewer, and so ultimately Casshern fails in this category.
Should appeal to people of most ages, who want to see a visually pleasing film, but too frequently Casshern substitutes looks for substance and in doing so can become incredibly frustrating to watch. JD
