Here is a film as we dream to see more often, namely a completely unclassifiable work, able to gain support to those who love war movies and those who hate ...
Directed by Sydney Pollack in 1969, "Castle Keep" (The Castle in Hell), this film presents us with a squad of eight U.S. soldiers in full slump in the Ardennes in 1944.
This particular group consists of Major Abraham Falconer (Burt Lancaster), Captain LIONEL BECKMAN (Patrick O'Neal) and Sergeant Rossi (Peter Falk).
From the first sequence, the film's tone is set: the 8 soldiers find themselves stuck with their jeep on the edge of a forest, and they cross the path of the Earl of Maldorais and his wife, the young Countess of Maldorais, in a sequence filmed in slow motion in which two diametrically opposed worlds collide, the world warrior and the dream world that we think out of the movies on EDGAR POE CORMAN, namely the Count and Countess filmed slow galloping horse with grace and style, served with soft music by Michel Legrand, in cons of the rough foot-soldiers, their state of dirt and physical decay and moral Count offers them all to the host in his castle, a splendid castle lovingly cared for by himself, last descendant of the dynasty of Maldorais.
Sydney Pollack, witty caustic vis-à-vis its characters, depicts their tormented souls on an almost surgical.
The COUNTY intends to preserve at all costs the historical heritage of its magnificent castle, which becomes a character in itself.
We find that the Count is suffering from impotence, and fear of not being able to ensure the survival of his lineage.
What is telling a soldier who tells the story in voiceover "We occupied the castle for 13 days, but we did not know how long occupied the Major COUNTESS??" ... What a program!
Major FALCONER therefore likely to resolving the problem in a roundabout way of Count: meanwhile, boredom takes the rest of the troop for combat, Captain Beckman plans to stage a conference on art, advantage of the opportunity presented to him talk about the passion that great grown on the subject and the matter is all around him, paintings and sculptures in support, Sergeant Rossi, meanwhile, offers a different kind of theater: a short play about a stalker in rut! ! A whole program as well.
Moments of humor are still there, with the scene where a soldier back from the water a VW refuses to flow, being told the soldier that the war could be won faster with such material!
But while all these people pass the time as he wants to end the conflict Hoping to calm the threat becomes clearer and the war resumed its rights.
First snipers come to recognize the field, then, that the bulk of the invasion begins, jeopardizing the divine palace and its occupants.
And then the great art of SYDNEY POLLACK turns with a constant duality between universes crumble: FALCONER, cynical and disillusioned character, does not care to defend the heritage, it conceives castle as a place of defense against the Teutonic hordes, to the dismay of the Count, ready to mislead the enemy, but also BECKMAN who would also defend the castle from destruction.
FALCONER has a rather ambiguous with BECKMAN (MAGNIFICENT PATRICK O'NEAL), midway between the denial of his ability to be a soldier and a willingness to make him perform acts of bravery. And
Sergeant ROSSI, baker in civilian life, which is like ELDORADO bakery and the baker from the small quiet village near the castle.
The rest of the team tries to forget the war in the arms of the ladies of the brothel local company, allowing us to recognize the passage of Elizabeth Teissier in the female group, that group will not hesitate to help the soldiers in the attack by tanks in the village they defend the Nazis molotov cocktail ...
FALCONER, which is starved of men, tries to rally to his cause a group of conscientious objectors led by the brilliant Bruce Dern, converted into a haunted preacher, which entitles an absolutely surreal sequence (the film is completed) BURT LANCASTER, black band at the eye, rely on his white horse, now want to collect the group of objectors cut to pieces by shell fire: that war is so beautifully pathetic!
The film switches between real and illusory, with an attack of the castle where 8 soldiers are holed up in the rose garden, very thin cover for soldiers in danger and is expected almost to a final blood and the sound of Beethoven launched thoroughly!
For the rest, well, YMMV!
0 comments:
Post a Comment