Invincible
Jul. 13th, 2004 10:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alonewiththemoonWatched the Werner Herzog movie "Invincible" last night. It is based on a true story about a Jewish blacksmith from Poland who becomes a strongman in a cabaret show in Berlin in the 1930s, at first costumed as Siegfried, the Iron King, then later recasting himself as the New Samson, hero of Judaism, much to the distaste of the Nazis around him. It was a very interesting story but the movie was very flawed by some almost unforgivably clumsy filmmaking on Herzog's part--maybe it's because the language of the film is English rather than German, but some of the dialogue was dreadful. At one point a man of whom we have seen nothing but bad things turns to our hero--don't say it, I thought--and out of his mouth came the words "I wish we could have been friends." Such a cliched and, even worse, utterly unbelievable moment. Maybe the line was meant to be delivered with irony, but it just wasn't there. It's also a bit unfortunate that the actor who plays the strongman, Jouko Ahola, looks so much like Arnold Schwarzenegger, but I guess these mid-European strongmen must all look somewhat alike. Tim Roth was great as an ambitious occultist.
But it's still well worth watching for Herzog's eye. The opening scenes of a market in the Polish Jewish community are gorgeous, like Old Master paintings, and that beauty is held up throughout the film. You can feel your eyes drinking in the colors and images. The strongman's mother, in particular, was like a walking Vermeer. The timelessness and beauty of the people only served to highlight the anguish that one knows will come to them, even though the film ends well before Germany invades Poland. The city people evoked more modern painters--the pianist was clearly a Modigliani. Some dream/vision sequences are also stunning, although they do serve to remind one of a time when Herzog wouldn't have let a little thing like the boundary between reality and dream interfere with his telling of the story. In this film, they are not well integrated, whereas in previous films one has a hard time finding the line between what is real and what is not, and it doesn't really matter.
So as movies go, I'd give it three out of four stars (and that partly for the history lesson), but as a Herzog film I'd only give it two out of four stars. Available at Netflix.
But it's still well worth watching for Herzog's eye. The opening scenes of a market in the Polish Jewish community are gorgeous, like Old Master paintings, and that beauty is held up throughout the film. You can feel your eyes drinking in the colors and images. The strongman's mother, in particular, was like a walking Vermeer. The timelessness and beauty of the people only served to highlight the anguish that one knows will come to them, even though the film ends well before Germany invades Poland. The city people evoked more modern painters--the pianist was clearly a Modigliani. Some dream/vision sequences are also stunning, although they do serve to remind one of a time when Herzog wouldn't have let a little thing like the boundary between reality and dream interfere with his telling of the story. In this film, they are not well integrated, whereas in previous films one has a hard time finding the line between what is real and what is not, and it doesn't really matter.
So as movies go, I'd give it three out of four stars (and that partly for the history lesson), but as a Herzog film I'd only give it two out of four stars. Available at Netflix.
