Archangel (1991)

I gave it a 7.5 out of 10

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Part black comedy, part romantic drama, and part horrific war film-"Archangel" manages to blend these genres with its consistent surrealist style, the style that practically all of Canadian filmmaker Guy Maddin's films are made of. Before I continue this review I'd like to point out that I absolutely ADORE the films of Guy Maddin. I think of him as the Canadian David Lynch (and Lynch is my all time favorite filmmaker, so that's high praise), but comparing him to other icons doesn't truly do his work justice. He certainly has his own, distinct style, his films always mimic the visuals of a silent film, particularly those of Eisenstein. He also experiments a lot with use of overdubbing dialogue, a dreamlike atmosphere, and bizarre, dark humor. His style is not for everybody, but for those that can appreciate this oddball genius his films come across like underrated treasures, and "Archangel" may just be my very favorite.This film is both gruesome and powerful, it makes a statement about dealing with love and loss, while also entertaining us with its wacky plot and laugh out loud humor. I had a ball watching this bizarre, tragicomic tale, mainly due to its fast paced nature and heavy surrealism. Those who seek an other wordly experience will likely adore this film, for I think it best captures Maddin's famously odd style. The acting is at times somewhat wooden, but its obvious that this is the movie's intent. Much of the jokes are performed in a completely deadpan and slightly awkward manner, which makes them even funnier. The dialogue is great, the visuals are beautiful, the story is brilliantly weird, and I cannot find a single problem with this little masterpiece. Those who enjoy the avant garde must see this film as soon as possible!

I only know a few of Maddin's projects. This seems to be the earliest available.I'm really beginning a deep appreciation of this man's visual soul. While this project didn't change my life, it demonstrated the power to do so, like a strutting policeman among weak minds.What I like about his mind is how he seats the thing first in the soul, then in the cinematic vocabulary instead of the usual path which values character, motivations, narrative clarity. What he's done here is revisit Eisenstein. I don't suppose many filmgoers have much truck for a Russian silent filmmaker who was primarily occupied in Soviet propaganda. He developed some important ideas about how a scene (never a movie — only a scene) can be constructed from visual fragments — what it means to "see."His particular solutions aren't popular today, and the whole idea of slicing the eye has been appropriated to the service of now-conventional values of storytelling and the cult of celebrity — some few jokes and even fewer emotions destinations.Eisenstein's idea is based on the notion of readable cells of retinal comprehension, more or less of the same size which when combined give an impression. The more discrete the components in presentation the more comprehensible the assembly, what he called the collage.What Maddin does here is make a metaEisenstein. The story is set in Russia and populated by international warriors, all of whom have only a groggy notion of why they are there. Our hero, like Maddin, is Canadian. It is essentially a silent movie. There is a parallel movie that is a talkie, into which this silent, main piece is embedded.Within the silent movie is a sort of "movie within," exactly as abstract from the silent portion as the silent portion is to the talkie portion and thence not to our world (as is the usual case with folding) but to the world of normal movies.That "movie within" is the "illumination" a set of stage tableaux depicting famous battles. If you experience nothing but these — or rather if you skate over all the surrounding context and focus only on these — you will be rewarded. There's so much reference there.The overall theme of the thing is the hard boundary of memory, where the continuity of knowing begins and ends. In the story, this exhibits as amnesia plus a sort of quantum identity shifts — of women, who else? That's good, its valuable. But the interesting thing is how this is seated in the collage itself. Eisenstein's idea is that each cell, each image, of the collage needs to have some reference to the others. The art is in the nature of that reference. Maddin makes that reference sit on the cells. In his case they are not bubbles in transparent foam that light can shine through. Instead they are stones, smooth stones with hard impenetrable skins that only know themselves and keep forgetting those they are nestled against. So they forget who they are.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

This wierd, dreamlike film goes a long way on a limited budget, creating a completely unreal experience about a real historical event in Archangel, Russia during the Russian revolution.Like all of Maddin's other films, Boles is and anti-hero, his subversive obsession with Veronika could not be interpreted as love or heroic, a brillliant deconstruction of your average war movie.The ending is a bit disappointing (out of the brooding character with the rest of the film) but in all a great film.

Some movies can be called nightmare movies or like Lynch's Eraserhead, "a dream of dark and troubling things" and while Archangel is a film that falls into the "dream" genre, it is sort of like a whole bunch of mini-dreams that you get during catnaps strung together, and as such, is easily one of the most insane movies I have ever seen. Needless to say, I highly recommend it.