If you love surrealistic and existential films, you may enjoy "Castle Keep". There is lots of strange dialog and bizarre plot elements--such that it will probably confuse the average viewer--but the artsy may enjoy it. As for me, I am a retired history teacher and it just made me irritated, as the terminally stupid might just think this film is a documentary and people really talked and acted like this! The film is nominally about a group of American soldiers who are making a stand at a Belgian castle--waiting for the inevitable attack from the Germans around the time of the Battle of the Bulge (December, 1944). However, as they are waiting for this throughout most of the film, you see LOTS of little scenarios that seem very random--and have little, if anything, to do with the WWII era. There's the wife of the castle who sleeps with various men because her husband is impotent and he wants a son, there's an art historian(!) who gives lectures to men who have zero interest--but who LOVE to hang out at a brothel filled with 1960s-style prostitutes, a guy who is in love with a VW and predicts it's the car of the future, a guy who wants to do nothing but bake--so he hangs out in town and bakes bread, a group of religious freaks who are pretty much guaranteed to offend and folks talking about the meaning of life. It's all a lot of stupid nonsense if you ask me--especially since folks often dress and act like folks from the hippie 1960s (especially the ladies) and the music is very appropriate for a counter-culture 1960s film--thought this is supposed to be 1945! Some folks might think this is all clever--I think it's just dumb--and rather boring. The film only heats up near the end when the fighting starts, but that isn't enough and the film seems like a waste of some talented actors. Well worth skipping.
Review of Castle Keep
