Irredeemably awful and, for what is supposed to be a legendary cinematic groundbreaker, more boring than sitting in the dentist's waiting room and as entertaining as cleaning the cat litter box.
Powell: yes, the legend who brought us "The Thief of Baghdad" and "The Red Shoes" (which, as a former ballet dancer and later a balletmaster, remains a personal favourite). But ... a decade or two later and the trademarks have not matured: retina-burning oversaturated colours, over-staged illogical blocking (he's what'cha call an auteur, ain't he?), and mindboggling, dreadful acting down the line (OK - I liked the brief dance/murder sequence with Moira Shearer, but the choreography looked like something Mary Tyler Moore did on "The Dick Van Dyke Show" in the same era). Even the music is excrement in the ears.
Karlheinz Böhm (whose main attribute is that he is a son of Karl Böhm, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century and a Nazi collaborator; he did his post-war time and went on to conduct until he could barely lift the baton) seems to be aping Peter Lorre and has all the charisma of a public lavatory floor.
And he is just one among a sea of zombies.
I am extremely disappointed: I was led on for decades about what a masterpiece it was, and now that I finally catch up with it (thank you, Criterion; can I please get my money back?), I am hugely disappointed on every possible level.
To suggest this was "groundbreaking" and "ahead of its time" is pure heresy. Kindly have a look at what a true auteur was doing in 1960: watch some Goddard (up to 1967) and Truffaut and anybody from the nouvelle vague, some Visconti and Bertolucci, some Kurosawa and Teshigahara, some Buñuel, some Kubrick, some ... OK. You get the idea.
If you have any desire to see this overrated, over-hyped snoozer, just go do something that is at least relatively fulfilling.
Powell: yes, the legend who brought us "The Thief of Baghdad" and "The Red Shoes" (which, as a former ballet dancer and later a balletmaster, remains a personal favourite). But ... a decade or two later and the trademarks have not matured: retina-burning oversaturated colours, over-staged illogical blocking (he's what'cha call an auteur, ain't he?), and mindboggling, dreadful acting down the line (OK - I liked the brief dance/murder sequence with Moira Shearer, but the choreography looked like something Mary Tyler Moore did on "The Dick Van Dyke Show" in the same era). Even the music is excrement in the ears.
Karlheinz Böhm (whose main attribute is that he is a son of Karl Böhm, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century and a Nazi collaborator; he did his post-war time and went on to conduct until he could barely lift the baton) seems to be aping Peter Lorre and has all the charisma of a public lavatory floor.
And he is just one among a sea of zombies.
I am extremely disappointed: I was led on for decades about what a masterpiece it was, and now that I finally catch up with it (thank you, Criterion; can I please get my money back?), I am hugely disappointed on every possible level.
To suggest this was "groundbreaking" and "ahead of its time" is pure heresy. Kindly have a look at what a true auteur was doing in 1960: watch some Goddard (up to 1967) and Truffaut and anybody from the nouvelle vague, some Visconti and Bertolucci, some Kurosawa and Teshigahara, some Buñuel, some Kubrick, some ... OK. You get the idea.
If you have any desire to see this overrated, over-hyped snoozer, just go do something that is at least relatively fulfilling.