Well this seems like the type of film I was discussing on a panel about three-dimensional villians at the Writer's fest. Alas... I probably won't get a chance to see this film, unless we get lucky and it is picked up for distribution or I get a screener. But man, this thing sounds like a damn good film, and Sokurov's previous film, MOTHER AND SON was very good. So, here we go with Chi-Town Charlie...
Hi Harry,
Capone is out of town on business for the first few days of the Chicago Film Fest. Do not fear! He will be back soon to give you the goods on some of the other films shown.
I just saw MOLOCH, the controversial film from the amazing Russian director Aleksandr Sokurov, who is also the man behind 1997's highly stylized MOTHER AND SON (among other notables).
MOLOCH, in the barest sense, is a story about a few days in the life of Adolf Hitler. The course of action is spread across an odd sort of weekend retreat on a mountain-top castle with the company of Eva Braun, Dr. Josef Goebbels (and his wife), Martin Bormann, a priest, a scribe, and a dozen or so soldiers. It unfolds like a dream, and it tends to remain dream-like throughout, with plainly symbolic scenes emerging naturally through the course of the farcical court Hitler holds over his gang of loyal and fearful companions and servants. The dialogue is sparse but forceful, and you are treated to a rendition of Hitler that is very human: you see perfectly presented before you an explanation of Adolf the man, a man who is nearly if not totally insane, a man who explains that Christ can't give man anything because Christ is dead, but Adolf himself is not and once he conquers the world, all will treat him like a god living in man. He at times pretends to not know about the death camps and at other times laughs at how their corpses can be used for a variety of things, such as acting as fish bait. He stands at a private showing of a propaganda film and gestures as the conductor of the symphonic song expounding on loyalty to Hitler and to the party. The night before he leaves to launch a major offensive, he is depicted standing in his underwear in a small bathroom, with an equally demented (or perhaps totally sane) Eva as his only audience, while spouting off and nearly yelling as powerfully as he did when giving rousing political speeches to spectators of thousands. He claims to Eva, eventually, that death, the grim reaper himself, will be defeated at his hands. Eva says to him as he leaves that no, death is death, and that even he cannot beat death.
There are many other layers and subtleties to this film and I hope you have the opportunity to see it. There are moments when the sound of a distant bomb drop alone will crush your heart. If you see it, I think you will witness the mind and soul of a man who did such terrible things, and it will give you pause. There is a scene in the movie I can't stop thinking about. Hitler is explaining to a priest that if he wins--and if he conquers he will be hailed across the world as a powerful and great leader. But if he fails--he shall end up as worse than a doormat to even the lowliest of people. I think about the history of the U.S. or any other country for that matter and this ability for human nature to twist right and wrong to fit a purpose is omnipresent. Slavery. Slaughter of native populations. Treatment of the poor. This is what struck me, but I think it hit different people in different ways...
Oh, as a side note, the cast rocked. Go see it.
-Chi-Town Charlie
