Currently available as a 4-hour, double-disk DVD release feature film in the U. S. via Music Box FIlms, this miniseries from the late film fest favorite Raul Ruiz kind of grows on you as it unfolds a period drama set in the Napoleonic era at a glacial, somnolent pace, but ultimately peters out, along with this viewer's interest by the final boring, counter-productive reels. I've sat through a couple dozen of Ruiz's works, mainly at film festivals ranging from Cannes to New York and he leaves us a fascinating if at times consternating cinema legacy.
At its most basic, this filmmaker's approach carried on a tradition associated with Orson Welles, fable-style storytelling of tall tales, working as a self-styled independent maverick. I'm thinking particularly of Welles movies like "The Immortal Story", "Lady from Shanghai", "Mr. Arkadin" and his numerous unfinished projects.
Many Ruiz feature films are experimental, with numerous structural and photographic techniques that would alienate any mainstream audience, averse to self-consciously "artsy" effects. He refrains from that here, working for television in a historical drama arena widely accepted in PBS "Masterpiece Theater" mode. But I was pleased at the occasional flourish and burst of style that accents a defnitely dull, almost minimalist feel.
Bunuel was the greatest practitioner of using characters as literal story tellers to move the narrative into endless and even embedded flashbacks that would humorously mock the notion of long-winded "tall tales". Ruiz presents this frankly dated material dealing with social mores, overweening misogyny and all sorts of chivalry stoically, with the only humor coming in a strange depiction of an obsequious servant (presumably mentally ill) who prances about at his master's beck and call like a human pony, only to be used as a human punching bag when master becomes irritated.
The master character who like many of the principal male players takes on various identities that make the 4-hour saga difficult to follow at times (you gotta keep a scorecard), is exempt from Ruiz's tactic of having the characters sleepwalk through their performances -he gets to ham it up as an outsized black hat villain nicknamed Snake-Knife in the early reels. Ruiz also interrupts the drowsy narrative times with a Brechtian device of a tiny proscenium stage, resembling a Punch & Judy.box, to emphasize the theatrical nature of what we're watching.
After an hour or so of this tedious presentation I found myself becoming mesmerized by the antiquated use of coincidences to create a fatalistic storyline with so many subplots and characters magically tied together. This works wonders until the final hour-plus in which the action seems very redundant and quite anticlimactic. Presaging the craze to miniseries (and bingewatching) that has literally taken over a decade later, one becomes painfully aware that the "less is more" dictum holds true even though commercial motivation has led to producing endless miniseries remakes of movie adaptations ranging from "Westworld" and "The Handmaid's Tale" to "The Mosquito Coast".
The story here of a boy and his priest who live through many lifetimes' worth of mistreatment thanks to aristocratic societies' morays and ritualistic modes of behavior is a consistent downer, ending lameduckedly with a whimper, not a bang. Cryptic at times but mainly belaboring the obvious,it's a long slog recommended to only the most patient (and tolerant) of viewers. Kubrick's still underrated "Barry Lyndon", a favorite movie of mine back when it was first released, has many similarities and is egregiously superior, especially in its d.p. John Alcott's stunning visuals, to this shaggy-dog Ruiz tale.
At its most basic, this filmmaker's approach carried on a tradition associated with Orson Welles, fable-style storytelling of tall tales, working as a self-styled independent maverick. I'm thinking particularly of Welles movies like "The Immortal Story", "Lady from Shanghai", "Mr. Arkadin" and his numerous unfinished projects.
Many Ruiz feature films are experimental, with numerous structural and photographic techniques that would alienate any mainstream audience, averse to self-consciously "artsy" effects. He refrains from that here, working for television in a historical drama arena widely accepted in PBS "Masterpiece Theater" mode. But I was pleased at the occasional flourish and burst of style that accents a defnitely dull, almost minimalist feel.
Bunuel was the greatest practitioner of using characters as literal story tellers to move the narrative into endless and even embedded flashbacks that would humorously mock the notion of long-winded "tall tales". Ruiz presents this frankly dated material dealing with social mores, overweening misogyny and all sorts of chivalry stoically, with the only humor coming in a strange depiction of an obsequious servant (presumably mentally ill) who prances about at his master's beck and call like a human pony, only to be used as a human punching bag when master becomes irritated.
The master character who like many of the principal male players takes on various identities that make the 4-hour saga difficult to follow at times (you gotta keep a scorecard), is exempt from Ruiz's tactic of having the characters sleepwalk through their performances -he gets to ham it up as an outsized black hat villain nicknamed Snake-Knife in the early reels. Ruiz also interrupts the drowsy narrative times with a Brechtian device of a tiny proscenium stage, resembling a Punch & Judy.box, to emphasize the theatrical nature of what we're watching.
After an hour or so of this tedious presentation I found myself becoming mesmerized by the antiquated use of coincidences to create a fatalistic storyline with so many subplots and characters magically tied together. This works wonders until the final hour-plus in which the action seems very redundant and quite anticlimactic. Presaging the craze to miniseries (and bingewatching) that has literally taken over a decade later, one becomes painfully aware that the "less is more" dictum holds true even though commercial motivation has led to producing endless miniseries remakes of movie adaptations ranging from "Westworld" and "The Handmaid's Tale" to "The Mosquito Coast".
The story here of a boy and his priest who live through many lifetimes' worth of mistreatment thanks to aristocratic societies' morays and ritualistic modes of behavior is a consistent downer, ending lameduckedly with a whimper, not a bang. Cryptic at times but mainly belaboring the obvious,it's a long slog recommended to only the most patient (and tolerant) of viewers. Kubrick's still underrated "Barry Lyndon", a favorite movie of mine back when it was first released, has many similarities and is egregiously superior, especially in its d.p. John Alcott's stunning visuals, to this shaggy-dog Ruiz tale.