There is no coherent story here, so don't expect one. This film is to storytelling as abstract art is to portraiture - as a viewer, you may feel and guess at what the director's trying to say, but most of what you get from this, you'll have to dig deeply for.
There are fine (if occasionally and quite intentionally overplayed) performances here. The editing can be remarkably annoying, with flash cuts that you'll need to replay in slow to understand, and some intriguing shifts - a car changes color repeatedly, a shirt changes pattern, and probably more that slipped by me. Hundreds of brief scenes, some of which are clearly imaginary, others indeterminate, with some wonderful humor sprinkled throughout.
In the 'making of' feature on the DVD, one of the actors tells the story of reading the script, then calling the writer/director to ask what the movie's about - after a 40-minute conversation, he claims to have understood. I think I need to call Sir Hopkins up myself - I'm sure I could use some of that explanation.
I strongly prefer representational art, so this movie will never be one of my favorites, but it gets 6 stars for the skill and subtlety with which it was crafted.
There are fine (if occasionally and quite intentionally overplayed) performances here. The editing can be remarkably annoying, with flash cuts that you'll need to replay in slow to understand, and some intriguing shifts - a car changes color repeatedly, a shirt changes pattern, and probably more that slipped by me. Hundreds of brief scenes, some of which are clearly imaginary, others indeterminate, with some wonderful humor sprinkled throughout.
In the 'making of' feature on the DVD, one of the actors tells the story of reading the script, then calling the writer/director to ask what the movie's about - after a 40-minute conversation, he claims to have understood. I think I need to call Sir Hopkins up myself - I'm sure I could use some of that explanation.
I strongly prefer representational art, so this movie will never be one of my favorites, but it gets 6 stars for the skill and subtlety with which it was crafted.