 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|||||||
|
The Sacrifice 15 SCREENINGS 8pm Monday 21 April 2008 The professor could be just another pompous professor, a more likeable cousin to Uncle Vanya's Serebriakov, who used to teach things intelligent people have known for a long time and imbeciles will never under stand anyway. The postman could be just another eccentric postman who quotes Nietzsche and tells bizarre stories. The woman could be just another tormented wife who carries a question deep inside, that she never dares to formulate: 'I loved one man. Why did I marry another?' The servant could be just another strange girl, allegedly a benevolent witch whose powers' no one thinks to call upon. And the announcement on television could be just another false alarm... But Andrei Tarkovsky brings this singular genius into play, shedding a stark yet compassionate light on these people and events, in the tradition of the Russian greats (including Chekhov, Dostoevski or Moussorgsky). It is a light that illuminates the simplest movements of life, the offering of a gift, a walk along the bay, the reflection of a naked body in a mirror. These acts rip through the banal curtain of time, allowing the characters to catch a glimpse of something as overwhelming to them as a seer's prophetic words or a statue's awakening to life were to the heroes of our classic Western dramas.
"Andrei Tarkovsky's final film, The Sacrifice, is rereleased with a new print to celebrate what would have been the Russian director's 75th year. Impending nuclear annihilation sets the canvas for a dreamlike parable on the emptiness of modern, materialist life. It is a difficult film - slow-paced, unashamedly theatrical and heavily laden with philosophy – yet a profoundly satifying one: a rewarding display of filmmaking mastery that forms a mystical and enigmatic coda to a legendary career. Alexander (Erland Josephson) is an academic and former actor brooding his way through his 50th birthday. The intellectual mood and the eccentric nature of the characters are set from the first, where the postman interrupts his Zen-inspired lakeside monologue to argue about a character from Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Alexander's nihilistic despair at the death of spirituality plays out against a compassionate if unconventional family drama, until a shocking television announcement – of imminent nuclear apolcalypse – jolts him into a wrenching bargain with God. Those familiar with Tarkovsky's Solaris (or even the Soderbergh and Clooney remake) will know what to expect: long, elegaic takes, riven by poetic, fractured dream images; the striking movement of camera and cast; and the glorious use of light and sound. The sheer quality of the cinematic experience is remarkable, although the narrative seems slightly fumbled in amongst the jostling of themes. Alexander, seemingly aware of some coming end, directs much of his wisdom toward his mute son. That Tarkovsky was diagnosed with terminal cancer during the making of the film leaves its dedication, "in hope and confidence" to his own son, all the more powerful." "Andrei Tarkovsky's final film from 1986, re-released for the 75th anniversary of his birth, looks to me quite different twenty years on. It is brilliant and audacious, with one of the most extraordinary final sequences in modern cinema, and all in a manner which Hollywood in the succeeding decade would learn to call "high concept". But it is more complex and ambiguous than it appeared at the time: its tragic meaning has darkened and clotted with time. The setting is a Bergmanesque summer house in Sweden, in which Bergman's own repertory player Erland Josephson plays Alexander, a retired actor and author of great distinction, who is about to celebrate a sombre and faintly melancholy birthday in the company of his beautiful English-born wife Adelaide, played by Susan Fleetwood, along with children, servants, friends and locals. A radio announcement warns of an imminent nuclear apocalypse, and that night Alexander begs God to spare the world and in return he will destroy his family and everything he holds dear. ... Tarkovsky died the year of its release; Susan Fleetwood died of cancer nine years later, thus robbing us of one of the great actresses of her generation." Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
UK RELEASE 1986 DIRECTOR Andrei Tarkovsky
CAST Erland Josephson, Susan Fleetwood, Valerie Mairesse, Allan Edwall
RUNNING TIME 149 minutes
COUNTRY Sweden / UK / France
LANGUAGE Swedish / French / English (subtitled)
official film website
|
