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Too much of everything

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Another slice of demented surrealism from the Czech king of stop motion, Jan Svankmajer. This one's not up there with CONSPIRATORS OF PLEASURE, my favourite of the director's work so far, but it contains plenty of material of interest for fans of the unique and downright bizarre.The general emphasis of the narrative is to explore the writings of the Marquis de Sade and his ilk, by exploring the treatment of the insane who are locked up in mental institutes. This typically turns out to be a study of crazy people: the inmates have literally taken over the asylum in this case, so there's lots of bizarre behaviour, blasphemy, S&M, and plenty of the outlandish sequences that anyone exposed to the director's output will expect.LUNACY is no favourite of mine, as it feels that the premise is a little dragged out and repetitive, particularly in the first half of the production. It certainly picks up for the second half, but the viewer must put up with some terrible overacting and a general lack of resolution in order to enjoy the film fully. I admit I found it all a little histrionic and difficult to sit through, although my favourite moments were the inserts featuring the stop motion 'living' meat, the bizarre highlight of an incredibly quirky film.

This is a very good film. By now I've seen all the films of Svankmajer, including his early shorts and later long movies. It took me some time to really appreciate his longer films since they are somewhat different from his short movies. For me personally his short films still form the basis of his work and come the closest to art. The lack of a storyline and of a conventional structure rank his shorts among the most original in cinematography. His longer films have a more traditional structure with a storyline. For that reason his longer films didn't appeal the same way to me (as his short films does) for a long time. With 'Sílení' this came to an end. The film starts with Svankmajer himself introducing the film in his own personal nihilistic style. The film itself is a mixture of a 'normal film' with actors and on the other hand the inclusion of disturbing stop motion cinema. Svankmajer's most beloved actors, the cut off Tongues (I believe they are Cow's Tongues) are seen many times, often together in a twin pair depicting scenes of disturbance, violence, sex and in general Lunacy which is the name of the film. The actors are very good, especially the person who plays the Marquise (De Sade). But also Anna Geislerová (who plays the unstable Charlotte) and Pavel Nový (Servant Dominic) (who played a main Character in 'Conspirators of Pleasure' as well) are excellent. In 'Sílení' Svankmajer seemed for the first time to have found a convincing form for his longer films. It's very balanced through out and the film has a constant feel of threat over it. Svankmajer himself introduces his film as a horror movie. And in fact it is, but in a nihilist typically Svankmajer kind of way. The horror element is not about visual shocking effects, but much more psychological since it touches deep human fears. In this perspective I place it in the same row as Polanski's great films 'The Tenant' and 'Repulsion'. The sex scenes give the film an erotic element, although in a deranged way; The theme and story are very original. The film has a pleasant weirdness, but is never cheap like many of the director's who are influenced by Svankmajer. This film get's a 9 from me.

Ah, to watch the favorite of a friend. It's almost intimidating, is it not? To view a film that is so beloved by an associate, especially someone whose opinion matters to you, you're almost scared to watch for fear of disliking it. Thankfully, I had so such problem with Lunacy, a film that absolutely exceeded my expectations.The film documents the exploits of Jean, a man who has a continual nightmare about hospital orderlies taking him away in a straitjacket (he is betrayed by his dress shirt, which slinks across the floor and unlatches the handle), and becomes in a sense sponsored by a man referred only to as the Marquis. Jean goes through a hellish few nights with the Marquis, including a black mass, ritual rape and a live burial before being drafted into "preventive therapy", heading to a mental hospital to test two separate approaches: absolute freedom, and strict lockdown punishment. These scenes are intercut with several extended sequences featuring pieces of processed meat dancing, drinking and generally cavorting around as they wish.If you're not familiar with Svankmajer, the last sentence perhaps elicited a bit of a puzzled stare, but dancing meat is just par for the course for one of the last real surrealists, as he does stop-motion animation like no one else can. Now I've only seen one of his films, Alice, his solid but forgettable retelling of Alice in Wonderland, but this film has restored my faith in the man, as it managed to continually keep my attention throughout and keep me entertained, no less.The film is listed as a horror film, but I think that definition does the film a bit of a disservice, as there is as much wicked humor and social criticism that just one genre classification is impossible. Svankmajer's film in its early scenes seem to be taking its aim not at his surrealist contemporary Bunuel's favorite target, organized religion, but at a less judgmental variance on the same theme: the idea and definition of morality, as the Marquis, obviously inspired by the man who shared his namesake, while yes, questioning the existence of God, is more questioning the socially accepted norms of what is "right", as our protagonist vacillates between being offended and defending through offence of another early on and it raises a lot of interesting questions.Of course, the following scenes make that thesis irrelevant in the way you knew and hoped they would, as we move to our second half, where the film looks at the relative success rates of different manner of mental hospital policy, first where the inmates almost literally run the asylum, and the doctor assists them in their crazy games (there's an amusing sequence where the head doctor assists a patient by adjusting the pillow on the pillar he's currently smashing his head into), and the strict punishment policy, which isn't nearly as fun or nearly as interesting, as the new "real" head of the hospital is a bland buzzkill that has a lot of exposition but little of the fire of anyone else.In the acting department, Pavel Liska does "damaged goods" quite well, but as his character is much of a troubled wet blanket, he's not given much to stand on. As for Jan Triska, the Marquis early on gives a speech damning the existence of God that is the sort of thing familiar to anyone who has ever seen a film questioning religion, but it manages to be convincing and effective, purely on the strength of Triska's wild-eyed performance (although his shrill, glass-shattering laugh does most certainly grate). The fact that he looks remarkably like my upper-classman Honors English teacher (my all-time favorite) also proved a constant source of entertainment.All in all, it's not exactly going to make my top 10 of all, but considering my opinion going into the film was "I hope I don't hate it", I have to say that this is definitely a pleasant surprise, and an excellent film. Whew.{Grade: 8.5/10 / #15 (of 60) of 2005}

I recently saw this film at the Jeonju film festival in Korea. It was by far the best film I saw all weekend. Selini is like a combination of Godard, Herzog and classic Czech animation- the kind of committed and convincing political film making that is increasingly rare these days. In his introduction Svankmajer compares the excesses of extreme reactionary and liberal regimes and argues that we currentlycombine the worst of both worlds in encouraging people to do whatever they want whilst relying on punishment and fear to keep them under control. The plot (based on an Edgar Allen Poe short story) is simple- an innocent traveller bears witness to the lunatics taking over the asylum. But the nightmarish atmosphere of confusion and fear, enhanced by gruesome stop motion animation between scenes, is both compelling, disturbing and extremely effective in communicating the directors ideas. The acting is committed and convincing and the story has, like the decline into madness, a chilling inevitability about it. The film uses this simple story to explore more challenging philosophical concepts. You don't have to be a fan of art-house cinema to understand and enjoy this exciting movie. 9/10