This film is not about the relationship of fathers and children, not about a father and son who are trying to reconcile, forget grievances. Not about an old man with dementia who behaves like this because of his illness. "Still Alice" is the tragedy of a man losing his memory and himself.
It's not that close, sad as it is. Here is the clash of the old and “brave” new world.
The old world has prostate cancer, bad temper, chauvinistic habits, insensitivity and lack of empathy for anyone, selfishness and self-obsession, infantilism with the desire to subdue everyone and dominate.
The new world has forgiveness and tolerance, understanding and a desire to help, love for one’s neighbor and other Christian virtues.
That's what the movie shows. But is that really true? I think we can draw conclusions from the scene with a doctor's appointment. Where the “old world” is literally raped, unceremoniously, publicly and without paying attention to lamentations and pleas not to do so. Not for nothing, “in the doctor’s office, Cronenberg always moved his hand in a glove to the lens”, knowing “that this makes his hand look unnaturally large” (as it is written here, in the facts about the film).
Only, most likely, such a turn came out accidentally, and was not conceived by the director. Otherwise, it would be very curious, a kind of Aesopian language, in a world where nothing can be said directly. But no, the two sides of this conflict are too monochromatic.
I ended up with a puzzle, an evolution of films with the subject of unconventional relationships in the plot, from Philadelphia through Brokeback Mountain and, say, The Client is Always Dead and American Family, to this movie. In the first, we are shown that there are such people, others, but they also suffer, and the world poisons them. In the second, we are already immersed in relationships and realize that these people are not different, but the same. In the third and fourth series, they live a normal life. And here is the final - the others, those who used to be the majority, and they are bad and now it is their turn to be bullied.
And how to not believe in the concept of Overton windows.
The film is well made (which is sad in this case), but I put a negative assessment, because it is too propaganda, and I am against “overturning the stick”.
This is an extremely unusual, one might even say unusual movie.
The film is partly based on Viggo's memoirs, shot in a heartfelt, poignant and beautiful way. You feel conflict, perfectly executed and humorous moments, everything is holistic and pleasant. The film is certainly unusual to the ordinary viewer and leaves some questions, but the work is brought to mind and done qualitatively.
Viggo in the frame, as always calm and reasonable. It's a pleasure to watch it.
The son of Viggo Henry, also participated in the project, playing a cameo role.
It seems that each frame is filled with some calmness and beauty.
Viggo performed his role, directed and wrote the script and music for his film.
The fall is definitely a phenomenon. Unusual, not for everyone, but interesting.
The Fall is the directorial and screenplay debut of Viggo Mortensen. Finally, right? He has already captured all the girls (and not only) of different ages (and not only) with the role of a romantic hermit Aragorn. Well, that's where the listing stops, because "The Lord of the Rings" was watched by almost everyone. “Captain Fantastic” or “Green Book” was watched, but not all. For example, I never got to them. But to appreciate the film, I think it is not necessary to know all the roles of Mortensen, although he plays here. He plays the role of the most patient son in the world.
Willis Petersen flew to Los Angeles to his son John to solve the issue of moving: the farm is no longer strong and healthy, and it is a long way away to just visit each other. It's just a family story, it seems. But Willis was a real tyrant, and John, although he has long grown up and started a family, now and then returns to bad memories of childhood and adolescence. The most interesting thing is that the father has not changed, and together with senile amnesia, he becomes a real pain in the ass in absolutely any everyday situation. And continues to beat his son for a variety of things - from family relationships to simple household habits. But Willis still needs help and care, so there is nothing to do: you need to help - and endure, endure until you boil.
This drama is not only about complex relationships, but also about the fact that from generation to generation everyone tries their best to be “not like that”. It doesn't always work out. Willis is such an asshole, but he often remembers that his father treated him even worse. Which means somehow, he tried not to look like a monster. Maybe it didn't work. Not all the way. But in the next generation, John went to great lengths to take a completely different behavioral path. And he succeeded: he only exploded once, and that's because he never heard a warm word from his father. Not a single word about how much your father loves you.
"The Fall" is very difficult to watch, because both in John's past and in the present, the father behaves disgustingly, and his periodic forgetfulness is superimposed on this, aggravating each individual case. You just don’t understand how you can tolerate it at all. But that's the father, the parent you wouldn't be without, right? And, probably, in another way, it simply does not work out: no one wants to be left alone in old age, and therefore makes this “pledge” for the future, a contribution to karma or redemption for several generations at once. It remains only to guess until - and if - you yourself do not get into this situation.
But the interesting thing is, what does Willis think? What does he think about every time he snaps or mutes in response to any question? What makes him cruel to his own children? There seems to be no answer to that question. But that doesn't make Willis lost. And as the fall occurs, we still get evidence that this man can — could certainly — love, and loved, and cared to the best of his ability and within his character for loved ones. How could I, how able I was, how educated I was. If he didn’t get warmth while growing up, would he be able to give warmth to his children as they grow up? Almost certainly not. But he did not abandon them, did not make them disabled, did not leave his women. It turns out that love has many different faces. Both fatherly and sons. Everyone. If there is love, there is forgiveness, right?
I can’t say that I enjoyed the film. So simple and straightforward. No, I got an emotional experience, which is probably more important. Pleasure relaxes and sometimes even turns off many psycho-emotional receptors, and then it is very difficult to take anything from what you see. There's no comfort here. But you see a lot - through the eyes of Mortensen, you notice a lot, believe in a strong acting and yourself for a long time still think about how such coexistence is possible within one family. It's a very family movie. For everyone together and each individually. And it's very beautifully shot. Some of the footage seems to float across the screen straight from our childhood to someone else.
It's a heavy movie. The relationship between the son and the feisty father leaves an unpleasant residue from viewing. But those who love Viggo as an actor will enjoy his performance. I didn’t feel much excitement, and I watched the movie because of him.
Calm and seasoned pilot John brings to his elderly father Willis, who by old age got a lot of sores and kind of wants to move from the farm from the other side of the country and buy a house closer to his son. That’s just John is gay with an established family life, and Willis is a homophobe, racist, chauvinist and misogynist, and in general an extremely nasty old man who has poisoned the lives of his loved ones for years.
What to congratulate Viggo Mortensen, for whom “The Fall” was the debut in the field of drama and directing, is tact – he avoids tearful melodramatism, poster vulgarity and other mistakes that directors can make when implementing similar plots. John’s ultra-liberalism (a gay family man with no bad habits with a Chinese husband and a Latino adopted daughter who voted for Obama) is not a cliché here, but the red rag that Willis, who is not so much a conservative as a stiff and backward bull bull, stuck in his own concepts of what is right and what is not, because of which he fiercely, furiously hates everything different (though, to be honest, if John were of a normal orientation, this would not change anything). It seemed that he was the start for a heated relationship, broke through years of restrained grievances, unspoken words and attempts to see each other from different sides in the spirit of the brilliant Autumn Sonata, reaching the final catharsis. But, to the enormous astonishment of the audience, this important development does not occur at all.
What, in fact, should serve as the introductory touches of the first 15-20 minutes, describing the characters and creating our initial idea of them, stretches Mortensen for the whole film: Henriksen almost two hours incessantly rages about and without, screams, profanities, throws objects and calls everyone in a row whores and faggots, and Mortensen, unlike the viewer, who by the end of the first half hour wants to wring an old villain’s neck, patiently silent and rolls his eyes. So do the rest of the characters, including John’s unscripted sister (Laura Linney), with whom they kind of tried to build their line, but quickly took it out of the narrative. But the movie is now and then divided by flashbacks, with the help of which we are persistently told what a goat in life was the father (completely different from the young Henriksen Swede Sverrir Gudnason), but show that happy moments in the past life seem to be the same as they were, although in fact only one paternal insult was already enough to cross out any pleasant moment.
But the most important thing is that it is not clear from the communication of Willis and John what can be learned in the end, since Mortensen very vaguely explains why someone is still messing with the old scum and even enters into a conversation. The theme of forgiveness, which should be approached by feisty old people with one foot in the grave, seems to be some weak excuse for almost two hours of watching the non-stop spewing the same curses grandfather, with whom almost no one enters into the necessary confrontation, only gently reminding that he does not love anyone and confuses the facts because of dementia.
Probably, for the first steps in directing and scripting, this is still forgivable, since Mortensen, being an unimportant psychologist, still shows the presence of a strong hand and a certain professionalism, does not centralize the action exclusively around himself and allows you to reveal the excellent Lance Henriksen, who, despite a rather one-sided image, finds how to portray Willis as vividly as possible. Well, a special thank you for inviting David Cronenberg to the episodic role of a proctologist - it is not every day you see how the creator of "Fly" and "eXistentsia" sticks the old "Bishop" finger in the ass.
In our time, when the “liberal” foundations of modern society have outperformed the expectations of some and captured a good part of the media environment, when the vast majority of films, both intended for wide distribution and indie films to the delight of critics at “elite” festivals, are on the agenda in most cases only for the sake of a tick, and in them racial, sexual and sexual problems are present simply because, even if not necessary for history. However, I expected something different from the directorial debut of the famous actor Viggo Mortensen, who directed and wrote the gay drama “The Fall”; after his participation in the magnificent “Green Book”, I expected a serious immersion in LGBT topics without annoying pop tinsel. But unfortunately, the film was rather disappointing, or even left with almost an empty bag for impressions. And although it can hardly be called “tolerastical garbage” or propaganda, unfortunately, all the problems raised in it, both related and non-LGBT, are simply not solved. But let's be clear.
The main character is John (played by Viggo himself), who brings his elderly father Willis from a snowy farm, where he spends his days only in the company of horses, to sunny California, where he lives with his husband and daughter. His father (Lance Henriksen) disapproves of homosexuality and in every way hurtfully pricks, and John struggles to establish communication, although it does not turn out very well. The other half of the story we on behalf of the hero Henriksen, only in his youth performed by Sverrir Goodnason (by the way, creepy as a young Viggo), we observe flashbacks from John’s childhood, about his difficult relationship with his parents, divorce and other not the happiest days.
As I said at the beginning, in many movies, LGBT people are present just for the sake of the checkmark and make no sense. The fact is that almost the same thing I can say about “The Fall”; the key theme of the picture is exactly the conflict between father and son, and the fact that John is gay, has no semantic load – there is even no justification for this in flashbacks; here he shot a duck to the delight of his father, here. What? Why is that? What is it? But even the conflict of generations does not work here properly, because John’s father as a character at first seems cool, albeit a little infantile guy, but then suddenly breaks down and becomes in an instant the worst father and the worst husband, destroying the family and humiliating all his loved ones, to please himself. And the years go by, and Willis does not change; he is a racist, sexist and simply a humlo, a nasty and disgusting old man who simply has nothing to empathize with; his problems with the intestines do not cover everything he has done and continues to do for his family.
I am not going to chase Mortensen; the film looks great and is quite skillful - the shots are beautiful, chic work with color, the soundtrack is good (by the way, by Mortensen), the actors worked well; perhaps, only on the play of the two main actors and the emotional part of the film is built (and I also liked the play of Hannah Gross, unexpectedly similar to Leia Seida, well, and Laura Linney, although she for the most part just sat crying), because it is monotonous, small-event and, in fact, not particularly dramatic. In the end, the film is not the worst, and you can probably enjoy it at a certain mood, but it could be much better if at least some of its semantic lines and messages were revealed and brought to the end.
6 out of 10
Viggo Mortensen has three Oscar nominations, but for some reason, most viewers still do not take the deserved Aragorn seriously enough. And in vain: Mortensen is a master of all trades, who in addition to acting is fond of theater, painting, poetry and music. It seems that this is the same person who loves variety and generally prefers something imperceptible, but deep, to any high-profile project. So it happened with “The Fall” – a simple and understandable film, far, in fact, from the esoteric revelations of art house. Sensual and unpretentious debut could be filmed only by a methodical and patient creator, and this is a good application for a promising directorial career.
Drawing on his own life experiences, as well as touching on universal themes of family and grief, Mortensen uses The Fall to rethink his relationship with his real parents. A caring mother, a hard-to-communicate father are not new things in themselves, but they harbor emotional wealth. Approximately half of the timekeeping of “Fall” unfolds in flashbacks, where details of communication within a single family are revealed. The script manages to be tough, but at the same time in something gentle. At the same time, the general plot is quite objective: it is something between the therapeutic experience of Shia LaBeouf in “Cute Boy” and “Wild Life” by Paul Dano, where the bitter divorce of his parents served as fuel for a fire in the director’s head.
Artistic exaggerations, of course, were added for the sake of conjuncture: first, Mortensen plays gay, although in real life this is not the case. This character choice enhances drama and conflict. Secondly, the former star of the militants in the face of Lance Henriksen for some time gets a worthy tragic role.
Henriksen just plays Willis - a father with a bad character, who even in his old age behaves crazy. Naturally, he despises his son the most. Interestingly, the character of Mortensen does not succumb to provocations, and the script prefers a more subtle approach. The Fall isn’t just about a father-son relationship, it also reflects Mortensen’s interactions with his mother. Although it would be too primitive to say that the protagonist is a mama’s son, the psychological portrait of the hero is clear: it is difficult to get out of a psychological prison, being imprisoned in it by such an authoritarian figure. At the same time, Mortensen gracefully and almost intuitively interweaves the past and the present in his characters, causing ambiguity: do all the memories in the film belong to John or is it Willis’s subjectivity – the son’s attempt to understand his father?
As the film delves deeper into this topic, the peculiarities of the relationship between Willis and John a little “washed up”. It is likely that the very relationship of two men during the viewing becomes less convincing than the lessons that can be learned from them. Mortensen asks: What is courage and is it worth appreciating, even if it is the only adequate trait of his father? This is most impressively demonstrated in the beautiful final scene (and, ironically, in the opening sardonic phrase of a father to his newborn child). It is at these moments that cinematic poetry is presented in a concentrated form and freed from the inertia of the plot.
And here is how director Mortensen set himself a difficult task. "The Fall" seems to refer to those kinds of films where the plot itself moves toward some sort of redemption. However, things are much more complicated, and Mortensen is smarter to end with a frivolous reconciliation. Rather, the script is more interested in uncovering issues of humility and acceptance, from a darker side than usual. A significant part of the “Fall” is devoid of fatalism, although it inserts a couple of remarks that are inverse to this statement. One way or another, Mortensen made a well-written drama with voluminous characters and, as you would expect from this talented actor, the film is shot with attention to detail.
7 out of 10
I don’t understand how Russia could cut a film about Elton John, but miss 'The Fall'. I haven't seen a more prolific movie lately. I didn't go to that kind of movie. I was going to the drama, the father-son relationship, which wasn't always smooth. And got on the benefit of positive discrimination, a potential nominee on the "Lenin Award" & #39; (as everyone jokes now about the Oscars), a film in which gay Asians help an ungrateful cisgender white man. Who in his youth behaved like a man, and in his old age he has only faggots and prostitutes around him.
I will tell you a little more, although I think many have already realized that the poster of this film is a fraud and it is not worth it. But still, I want to focus on the positive aspects of the picture, the theme of human loneliness and the excellent work of the operator. Explain what caused my negativity. I usually enjoy watching LGBT movies and always give them high scores. Or almost always.
The story begins with the fact that we show an elderly man who has survived to insanity, who is helped by his gay son. And he'll rinse and humiliate him for it. Later we are shown that the son has an Asian husband and they have an adopted daughter. To this ' family idyll' joins a sister, for some reason without a husband, but who has one of the children is also gay, and the second seems not yet decided. All this is accompanied by flashbacks, in which they constantly show what kind of father the guy is stupid, who puts no one in anything but himself. A stupid egotist, an infantile moron and a child who cannot feel. But gay people are the exact opposite. One of them works in the hospital, and the second pilot. And how they communicate with others worthy of Jesus Christ.
And the whole movie revolves around these black and white, unambiguous characters. No one here has the truth. It's clear and definite. These are good, and this one is bad, stupid. Images are very far from real people who are rarely holy, whether they are gay or not.
I will once again emphasize good camera work, good scenes of the hero’s early childhood, and the theme of loneliness of man, man and nature, man and the sea. But it's all so small that I don't know why he was given the best film at the San Sebastian International Film Festival.
An aging father cannot cope with a lonely life on a farm and comes to Los Angeles with his son’s family. Will father and son be able to overcome the pain they have caused themselves and each other all their lives and rise above the conflict of two worldviews?
An elderly and conservative father-grunt Willis, who has "panic attacks" & #39; and health problems, travels to live with the family of his gay son John, who lives with his daughter and a Chinese husband. This film is ' interweaving ' stories from the past and the present. In the past, a young family lives on a farm: a father and son shoot ducks (after hunting for mallards, little John washes in the bathroom and sleeps with the first shot duck), and wait for the appearance of his sister. In the future - the family is waiting for the expected or not - ' Turns of fate', the appearance ' new people' in the lives of children, and the son will remain with his truth ' essence' Memories from the past - ' Thieves' problems and circumstances that torment heroes, and an aging father - does not let them forget. ' Flashbacks' Memory - it's like ' series' memories in the heads of Willis and John: each takes ' past' - in his own way.
'What did you do good for the country being gay?' asks John's father, and in every possible way he ' tacks' on this topic. The trembling relationship of father and son is the main essence of the film, which in the end, rather becomes the life story of the father himself, following the final scene of the film.
The directorial and script debut of one of the iconic actors of Hollywood Vigo Mortensen is the story and research of the fate of an individual family, which literally under the microscope shows everything ' flaws' and 'sick places'. In some moments - all this is like 'Tree of Life' Terrence Malick. Mortensen creates something deep, grand and impressive. Mortensen described the film as a personal story inspired by his parents. A beautiful acting ensemble (along with Mortensen, there are strong works by Lance Henrixen and Sverrir Goodnason (as a young Willis) and the amazing and deep editing of Ronald Sanders. Every family is happy and not happy in their own way. You can't understand. Where in this sentence to put the sign ' dash' - everyone will understand in his own way.
A middle-aged man takes his father, suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, from his native farm in the picturesque north and takes him to someone else’s nondescript California, the only advantage of which is the ocean – synonymous with the inner world of his father, who dives into the depths of his memory as sharply as waves roll on shore.
During the memorial journeys, the father scrolls through the stages of his life, molding reality and sleep into one nervous lump that constantly throws at his son. He also makes mental promenades into the past and completes his father’s visions. We are shown an angry, self-willed old man who cannot come to terms with weakness and loneliness. He is a Republican, a farmer, and a creepy proprietor, demonstrating his rights to real estate and people in a way that is depressing to any liberal person. It's hard for him to get along with anyone. Jealousy and constant emphasis on possessive status, he led one wife to leave the house, and then another. He tyrannized children, causing them emotional and sometimes even physical injuries, not leaving this sweet occupation in old age. But now he needs to adapt to life under the wing of a gay son, complete with a Chinese husband.
Separated from the picture, the plot of the film looks like a template Oscar-pretentious drama, but in fact it is a deep film about the relationship between father and son, about the difficulties of reconciling the old generation with new values, about fear, about love and forgiveness. The father is as ambivalent as possible. He knows how to love, care, forgive mistakes. He constantly remembers his wives, in a colorful verbal form expressing his contempt for them, and in pictures from memory appealing to happy moments. He loves his granddaughter and is episodicly good at the object of his son's love. Son's not a flat wall either. He tolerates the attacks of his father for a long time, but remembers the youthful rebelliousness and at one moment tries it on himself as an adult. As a result, love and forgiveness outweigh and the fierce combat of father and son ends with a touching embrace. This is not the finale of the film, but the epilogue of the story of two people connected by genetic and psychological threads.
The film has many emotional jumps that make the viewer go from irritation to tender empathy. The multi-layer plot is catalyzed by an aesthetically pleasing picture replete with pastoral landscapes, as well as emphatic acting and decent directing. The film is worth watching in the original due to the difficult equivalent dubbing of Lance Henriksen's voice.
The story of the kind of “humpback grave will correct”. And strength gives her a disgruntled solo Lance Henriksen, representing an old man who survived from the mind, into whom the once narcissistic despotic head of the family degenerated, who could not withstand the pressure of his male dignity, flying in different directions, which did not break the character of his father, at the end of years forced to come to his son.
It is clear that Mortensen initially relied on this role, but it is also noticeable how he tries to avoid monopolarity, alternating the present time with flashbacks, creating a retrospective of the existence of family members, along the way detailing the relationship of children with their father, from early childhood to final maturity, it is unknown at what cost the hell of their father’s hole fell on them, definitely noting only the moment when the son throws off his father’s right hand, taking a step to his will.
A very pleasant impression is left by young people who appear in episodic roles of the early years of the character Viggo Mortensen, in turn, completely depressed by the temperament of his elderly partner, hopelessly throwing everyone else who appears with him in the same frame, to the far-off background - to escape from his ruthless replicas.
The fact that, having left his father, the son eventually began to live with a Chinese husband is a nuance, but not a highlight of this story where the director does not wave his personal opinion, leaving the interpretation of everything and everything to the discretion of the audience themselves, free to interpret the causes and consequences according to their prejudices or fantasies, supporting or denying the reproaches of a wayward grumpy who lived life, as it turned out, with one single thought.