Very strange movie by Harry Kumel, by far Belgiums most talented director. One wonders what the hell went through Kumels mind when he decided to mix several great, incredible, Visconti-like scenes (e.g. Van Ammelrooy and Van den Berghe by the fireplace, or the scene with Van Ammelrooy in the lake) with awful, overacted and - worst of all - unfunny comedy. In interviews Kumel called this film a satire on the bus-load of (mostly) awful rural films Flemish directors made through the years ('boerenfilms'): though this film IS clearly a satire on these bad movies, the satire part is the most uninteresting part of 'Het Verloren Paradijs' - unless you consider VERY bad film-making as good satire on bad film-making. The dialogs and acting are - just like the film itself - extremely uneven: Willeke Van Ammelrooy is delivering some really great acting here, Hugo Van den Berghe is impeccable and the little boy is OK, but Fred Van Kuyk, Bert André and most of the bit parts are really god-awful. Good camera-work by Ken Hodges.
2 Reviews
Exit to Eden
Nodriesrespect26 July 2012
Warning: Spoilers
One of the most talented Belgian filmmakers, Harry Kümel's cinema has been blighted by compromise throughout, sometimes with unpredictable results. Such as his deliberately sleazy and sensational DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS surpassing the "worthy" MALPERTUIS for which it was a fund raiser. A gifted orator, he could play the stolid local film commissions like no other, receiving benefits for projects that often wound up quite different from the way initially presented. Oh, to have been a fly on the wall when he tried to sell them on this one, his last theatrically released work until 1991's more than meets the eye literary adaptation ELINE VERE. Surely, large part in its success, indeed its very realization lay in the participation of French former actress turned producer Jacqueline Pierreux, mother of François Truffaut's muse Jean-Pierre Léaud and best known to genre fans for her role as the haunted nurse in the Drop of Water segment of Mario Bava's BLACK SABBATH. A great lover of cinema, she would contribute greatly to furthering the film industry, especially in Belgium, funding amongst other things such commercially risky ventures as animator Raoul Servais' sole feature TAXANDRIA.
The most unabashedly "local" of Kümel's works, this is very much a film of two halves, just as well since the narrative opposes nature (the paradise about to be lost implied by the title) against encroaching urbanization. On the one hand, there's the lofty poetic story with frequent allusions to the Bible's Garden of Eden taking place at the Mayor's mansion, frequently contrasted against the earthy humor of the village scenes with a string of locally highly recognizable character actors early on in their careers. Occupying his overgrown Eden, far from any madding crowd, is naive Mayor Benjamin Rolus who has seemingly turned his back on the world ever since a traumatic event from his youth, bearing witness to the "betrayal" by his adored niece Pascale with blue collar villager Jan Boel in the greenhouse. Although she knows more than she lets on, his stern old housekeeper Adeline nourishes his misinterpretation so as to better manipulate him herself.
Twenty years after the fact, Pascale returns to the scene of the crime. Now played by the formidable Willeke van Ammelrooy, still stuck with that sex goddess of the Lowlands tag although rapidly evolving into the revered character actress (see her stupendous lead role in Marleen Gorris' ANTONIA'S LINE) she's nowadays. One of those familiar character actors everyone knows by face rather than name, Hugo Van Den Berghe has turned up in countless films but remains respected mostly for his theatrical work with the Ghent National Theater for which he served a stint as artistic director in the '90s. The role of Benjamin provides him with a rare lead and he proves up to the challenge, adding a child-like innocence that's never over-played. It's no wonder that several of his best scenes are the ones where he's acting with young Stephen Windross, an exceptionally unaffected child thespian who unfortunately did little else. Trivia note : Hugo's real life wife Blanka Heirman turns up as dotty Marie-Louise, the concerned village woman whose elderly mother's about to be evicted for the new road that will divide their fictitious village of Hamelen rather than the Mayor's estate as originally planned.
While the villagers are planning an urban guerrilla uprising, spearheaded by idealistic schoolteacher Serge-Henri Valcke, the now all grown Jan Boel (the one and only Bert André showing much wider range than his characteristic caricatures allowed) has a personal axe to grind. As rival Adam to Pascale's Eve, he has longed to take Benjamin's place ever since childhood, not just as her lover but as the town's Mayor. All airs and graces, Pascale has actually become an albeit high class hooker "saved" by Boel to get back at Benjamin by re-introducing her as but one of several "serpents" into his quiet existence. Stalwart Gella Allaert, a veteran of stage and screens big and small until her death at 91 in 2002, is both hilarious and terrifying as the sarcastic housekeeper devoted to her master but determined to keep him from the woman he has loved his entire life. Though pressed into duty to bring about Benjamin's downfall, Pascale has a pivotal change of heart that causes the operatic excess of the film's overheated climax.
As the central story grows more intense, Kümel takes broad swipes at contemporary local politics which is probably what kept the film from traveling beyond Belgian borders. Played at sort of a rural comedy fever pitch, these scenes have inevitably aged much worse than the rest of the movie. The satire wasn't very subtle to begin with and now provides more unwelcome disruption to the narrative proper than anything else. I'm sure if Kümel were to return to the material, he would add considerably more nuance. Yet somehow this over the top approach carries its own conviction, reflected by dramatic effects in film's "serious" portion that are no less excessive, what with its dramatic denouement taking place during a thunderstorm. As with all of Kümel's films, there are short cuts he was forced into because of financial and artistic constraints, but even his most diluted endeavors remain rich and vibrantly alive. Stick around for the end credits and brush up on your Flemish/Dutch to reap the benefits of an absolutely haunting theme song by an accomplished though sadly uncredited female vocalist.
The most unabashedly "local" of Kümel's works, this is very much a film of two halves, just as well since the narrative opposes nature (the paradise about to be lost implied by the title) against encroaching urbanization. On the one hand, there's the lofty poetic story with frequent allusions to the Bible's Garden of Eden taking place at the Mayor's mansion, frequently contrasted against the earthy humor of the village scenes with a string of locally highly recognizable character actors early on in their careers. Occupying his overgrown Eden, far from any madding crowd, is naive Mayor Benjamin Rolus who has seemingly turned his back on the world ever since a traumatic event from his youth, bearing witness to the "betrayal" by his adored niece Pascale with blue collar villager Jan Boel in the greenhouse. Although she knows more than she lets on, his stern old housekeeper Adeline nourishes his misinterpretation so as to better manipulate him herself.
Twenty years after the fact, Pascale returns to the scene of the crime. Now played by the formidable Willeke van Ammelrooy, still stuck with that sex goddess of the Lowlands tag although rapidly evolving into the revered character actress (see her stupendous lead role in Marleen Gorris' ANTONIA'S LINE) she's nowadays. One of those familiar character actors everyone knows by face rather than name, Hugo Van Den Berghe has turned up in countless films but remains respected mostly for his theatrical work with the Ghent National Theater for which he served a stint as artistic director in the '90s. The role of Benjamin provides him with a rare lead and he proves up to the challenge, adding a child-like innocence that's never over-played. It's no wonder that several of his best scenes are the ones where he's acting with young Stephen Windross, an exceptionally unaffected child thespian who unfortunately did little else. Trivia note : Hugo's real life wife Blanka Heirman turns up as dotty Marie-Louise, the concerned village woman whose elderly mother's about to be evicted for the new road that will divide their fictitious village of Hamelen rather than the Mayor's estate as originally planned.
While the villagers are planning an urban guerrilla uprising, spearheaded by idealistic schoolteacher Serge-Henri Valcke, the now all grown Jan Boel (the one and only Bert André showing much wider range than his characteristic caricatures allowed) has a personal axe to grind. As rival Adam to Pascale's Eve, he has longed to take Benjamin's place ever since childhood, not just as her lover but as the town's Mayor. All airs and graces, Pascale has actually become an albeit high class hooker "saved" by Boel to get back at Benjamin by re-introducing her as but one of several "serpents" into his quiet existence. Stalwart Gella Allaert, a veteran of stage and screens big and small until her death at 91 in 2002, is both hilarious and terrifying as the sarcastic housekeeper devoted to her master but determined to keep him from the woman he has loved his entire life. Though pressed into duty to bring about Benjamin's downfall, Pascale has a pivotal change of heart that causes the operatic excess of the film's overheated climax.
As the central story grows more intense, Kümel takes broad swipes at contemporary local politics which is probably what kept the film from traveling beyond Belgian borders. Played at sort of a rural comedy fever pitch, these scenes have inevitably aged much worse than the rest of the movie. The satire wasn't very subtle to begin with and now provides more unwelcome disruption to the narrative proper than anything else. I'm sure if Kümel were to return to the material, he would add considerably more nuance. Yet somehow this over the top approach carries its own conviction, reflected by dramatic effects in film's "serious" portion that are no less excessive, what with its dramatic denouement taking place during a thunderstorm. As with all of Kümel's films, there are short cuts he was forced into because of financial and artistic constraints, but even his most diluted endeavors remain rich and vibrantly alive. Stick around for the end credits and brush up on your Flemish/Dutch to reap the benefits of an absolutely haunting theme song by an accomplished though sadly uncredited female vocalist.
See also
Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews
