A film review: "The Garden of Earthly Delights" [2004 Poland, UK]

Polish auteur Lech Majewski created a triptych (in film) by drawing inspiration from some of the well known medieval masterworks. The first - what he considers to be the 'left panel', is based on the fifteenth century Dutch master Hieronymus Bosch's own famed triptych "The Garden of Earthly Delights", which also serves as the film's title (the 'central panel' - The Mill and the Cross (2011), was based on Bruegel's painting named The Procession to Calvary, and the 'right panel' Onirica - Field of Dogs (2014), was based on Dante's Divine Comedy). He considers the trilogy as a personal spiritual quest to connect with the past and relate to the present world.









Based on Majewski's novel "Metaphysics", we are introduced to Claudine (Claudine Spitery) and Chris (Chris Nightingale) as Londoners who met and fell in love. While Claudine is an art historian with a passion for Bosch's eponymous painting, Chris is a boat engineer obsessed with filming Claudine with his handheld camera - in the process, providing Majeswki with his working material.

When Claudine confides in Chris about her terminal illness, and the fact that she had been given only a few months to live, they decide to move to Venice and spend their final days together. With the help of Chris and his camera, Claudine propounds her own understanding of Bosch's painting, and hopes to leave behind a worthwhile record of her existence through the personal film.

She offers a counterpoint to Dante's journey through purgatory in his Divine Comedy, by meticulously enacting elements of Bosch's much more uplifting vision of 'heaven' on earth, and aims to experience her own Utopia during the remaining days of her life. It is not as much the religious, but the metaphysical journey, that she hopes will make her life more meaningful...

The experimental film is shot like an intimate video diary - as Majewski puts it, like a "Black Box recording" of a tragic flight, capturing all the raw data regardless of significance. In order to add authenticity to the couple's intimacy, it was also filmed for the most part using a touristy camera, often with actors themselves as the camera crew. This was a gamble on his part that might not have helped the film commercially despite respectable performances from the main actors, particularly Ms. Spiteri, who portrays her character with spontaneity and grace.

My main concern with the film is the mismatch between the amateur filming (by actors), and the professional editing (handled by Majewski himself) within the context of a formal narrative - it only makes the photography appear more amateurish. And considering the fact that almost the entire footage is shot in this manner, there are times when watching the film also becomes a bit of an endurance, like a host forcing upon guests his personal home video that they might not be so keen on watching. The same excellent subject could perhaps have been shot professionally without sacrificing any of the intimacy that Majewski intended to get across.

Regardless of how the audience react to the film, they will certainly have to acknowledge the invigorating - almost scholarly, interpretation it offers on Bosch's eponymous painting that continue to divide opinion among art historians today. At least in my case, I'll be looking at this painting from an entirely new perspective when I revisit the Prado museum. For anyone even with a passing interest in art, the film should be Recommended Viewing..!

Amazon.it DVD Link [PAL] | Amazon.com DVD Link [NTSC]
(Both have original English audio)

 

The Nudity: Claudine Spiteri and Chris Nightingale
The film features intermittent nudity, mostly from Claudine Spiteri, as her character goes about enacting themes from Bosch's painting.



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A film review: "Onirica" [2014 Poland, Italy, Sweden]

Perhaps, one could've introduced director Lech Majewski here through one of his better known works, but his latest film, "Onirica" [Eng. Title: Field of Dogs] is nevertheless every bit as sumptuous as his renowned works, showcasing all the traits that make him an art film circle favourite, and should therefore be as good an introduction as any.










Majewski has clearly been influenced by past Italian masters such as Antonioni and Pasolini, and also his other contemporaries such as Greenaway and Angelopoulos. His films often delve into the esoteric and mystical, and some of his visuals can be unapologetically self-indulgent, drawing liberally from the high point of Renaissance and the Enlightenment. Like many of the names mentioned above, Majewski is a full-fledged filmmaker who can not only direct, but also write his own material, compose music, and handle cinematography.

Majewski considers his "Onirica" to be an inspired interpretation of Dante's "The Divine Comedy". Set against the backdrop of a series of unfortunate events that befell Poland in 2010, including the tragic plane crash that killed the country's President along with most of its political and defence elite, and the spate of natural disasters it had to endure that year, we observe Adam (Michal Tatarek) - a young poet, trying to deal with his own personal loss and ensuing psychological trauma following a car crash that killed the two people closest to him - his girlfriend and his best friend.

Adam had survived the crash, but carries permanent scars that are both physical and within. After giving up his career job as an academic, he had started working as a supermarket attendant. Often listening to an audio book of Dante's Divine Comedy, Adam experiences a series of surreal visions and hallucinations concerning religion and spirituality, that will bring disparate characters to life from his past and present.

Like his long dead father who appears at his supermarket and sets to plough the 'fallow' earth underneath its floor tiles, and the bikini-clad hostess from a TV game show who steps out of the box to offer him some 'hope'. His (living) philosopher-aunt (Elzbieta Okupska) comes the closest to consoling and forcefully explaining to Adam the relative nature of life and death within our own lives, by borrowing quotes of thinkers from Classical Rome.

As with most of his work, Majewski presents some strikingly memorable images as he takes us through Adam's soul-searching exercise, much like Dante's own journey through Inferno, Purgatory, and Paradise - and Adam's deceased girlfriend, like Dante's Beatrice,  is similarly resurrected to accompany him in the later part of his 'journey', eventually ending up in a cathedral altar that becomes flooded by a sudden deluge. Spectacular stuff indeed, and if you're in a contemplative mood, you might even enjoy the ride that Majewski gives us. Recommended Viewing..!

Amazon.it DVD Link [PAL]

 

The Nudity: Ewa Matula and Anna Mielczarek
As part of one of his visions, we see Adam dream about a young mother (Ewa Matula) feeding a baby in a river island. Anna Mielczarek plays Adam's deceased girlfriend, brought back to life through a kiss while an angel watches, and they levitate while making love. A dove fluttering across the room to perch on a window as this happens completes this rather surreal scene, me thinks..!




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