Nostalghia

Tarkovsky keeps the emphasis on nostalghia and not on sentiment or melancholia. Giuseppe Lanci's (Kaos '84, Caro Diario '94) beautiful colorful cinematography alternated with b/w footage, is reminiscent of Traffic (Soderbergh, 2000), although the content and the pace of that film is very different. The point is, that different filming materials can emphasize different perspectives from different people or different periods in the life of the same person. Luminous or dark. Even a long and slow shot can tell a complete story in this film, as the actors seem to duplicate themselves or substitute others. Miniature landscapes to create surprising visual perspectives are discovered at the ride-in and ride-out of the camera. All those details couldn't be appreciated if the shots were any shorter or the pace any faster. Nevertheless, there are instances where Tarkovsky doesn't seem to know what he wanted exactly and motives stay implicit unfortunately. But that's poetry. See the film again and discover new perspectives. Anyway, there is a strong taste of longing for association of people in the present, in the future and even in the past throughout the film.

Nostalghia is almost entirely (as far the dialogue part of the film goes) in Italian language and the music consists exclusively from legendary composers with some experimental touches here and there. It is on the verge of being arthouse with its sometimes subtle and sometimes experimental light and sound FX. Even the dog seems to have had acting classes. Also I feel that what Godard tried so many times (le Mepris? Week End?) but utterly failed most consistently, Tarkovsky achieves gloriously, although the film shouldn't be much longer.

10 points out of 10 :-)

It's sometimes true that the most demanding movies can yield the most lasting rewards, and the penultimate film by the late Andrei Tarkovsky certainly puts the theory to the test. This was the first feature he directed outside the Soviet Union, and its protagonist is (like Tarkovsky himself was) a Russian artist exiled in Italy. But don't expect anything remotely plot-driven; like other Tarkovsky films it's a dense, challenging exploration of faith, madness and memory: beautiful, enigmatic, intellectual, and extremely slow moving. Many of the sequences are a labor to sit through, but the final shot, in which the director transplants a Russian cottage (complete with landscape) inside the massive walls of an ruined Gothic cathedral, is by itself compelling enough to erase the aftertaste of even the most tedious passages.

What a strange film, utterly lacking in narrative, self-indulgent, in a sense tedious, but I sat transfixed for two hours. Someone once described cinema as 'painting with light' and there isn't a single shot in this movie you wouldn't have been proud to photograph. It's utterly beautiful. You don't engage with it as you would with a regular movie, you just sit back and let the images wash over you, frankly I could have watched with the sound off and the subtitles off. I'm lying about the sound. Tarkovsky is a genius for dripping water. The switch between film stock is incredible, the sepia is some of the most breath-taking cinematography I have ever seen. This is pure art house cinema in all its gorgeous, pretentious grandeur.

Apparently even Tarkovsky described this film as 'tedious', so you can imagine what it's like to be on the receiving end. But for some reason I don't find it so, although there is the occasional longuer. It's one of the great films of cinema, although certainly rather odd. Once again it has an impossibly glamourous Russian wandering about looking moody, engrossed in the big issues. In fact, the female lead falls for him and is exasperated by his absurd interest in a local derelict. She flashes a tit in erotic frustration which is unusual for Tarkovsky, he seems unwilling to really engage in issues of sexuality, preferring them to be chaste in an almost victorian manner. Certainly there was some accusations of a reactionary attitude to women, for at the start of the film a priest tells the guide that she should sacrifice herself for the sake of raising children. She is made to look rather absurd in the film, but in truth, so do the male characters. Perhaps it was due to cultural traditions in Tarkovsky's background rather than deliberate misogyny.

The Italians didn't take to this film as it did not film Italy in a vibrant manner, preferring to evocate the alienation and melancholia of it's Russian lead. Tarkovsky's brilliance as a director is well illustrated in the film where the Russian and the old man talk in a room. The camera seems to turn a full 360 degrees although you don't notice it. The way his characters and objects seem to float in and out of frame is amazing. It's strange, but nature seems to perform for Tarkovsky. Even the animals seem willing to be directed, a dog staring straight into the camera with an almost unearthly and uncanny presence and stillness. The scene where the Russian lies on his hotel bed and his nostalgia conjurs up his dog in a dream like but also tangibly real manner is powerful and haunting.

The problem with this film is that the lead character was not really in exile and could go home anytime, unlike Tarkovsky himself, so why was he in so much pain? Is it mere homesickness as opposed to the real longing for one's homeland rightly belonging to the truly disenfranchised? But perhaps that is not the issue, more that when man finds himself and true wisdom, is it too late in the day for him to use what he has learned? The self sacrifice of the old man is a return to an old theme of Tarkovsky's that perhaps only shame can save mankind.

There are many eccentric aspects to this film, for instance the Russian wandering around up to his waist in water. Also there is a brief and bizarre shot of an angel stomping around outside a house. As it's Tarkovsky you don't burst out laughing. Perhaps he reaches the parts other directors cannot reach.

But there are also some vividly beautiful moments. The doves being released in the church, and the light filtering through a stream of water in a gutted house. Towards the end of his career, Tarkovsky began to question the rigid criteria he used in shooting a film in a way he felt won purity and aschewed the vulgar and trivial, but I think he got it right here. A marvelous film.

Everybody who has seen some Tarkovsky movies knows that a thrilling plot is not to be expected. However with "Nostalgia" Tarkovsky seems to outperform himself in this respect. Maybe this is the reason that "Nostalgia" is the least viewed and least reviewed film of the Tarkovsky oeuvre. I saw some clips with an interpretation of the movie that had a longer running time than the film itself!

The only thing that is petty clear is that "Nostalgia" is a film about homesickness. The film presents this in three layers. The main character Andrei (played by Oleg Yankovsky) is a Russian writer who does research in Italy about the 18th century Russian composer Pavel Sosnovksy (framed after the real composer Maksim Berezovsky) who was studying opera in Italy. Sosnovsky was homesick, as is Andrei a couple of century's later. The third layer is Tarkovsky himself. "Nostalgia" was his first film shot outside Russia, and he would not return to his home country. In this respect "Nostalgia" has a strong autobiographical element.

The film has two other main characters, the translater Eugenia (Domiziana Giordana) and the eccentric Domenico (Erland Josephson). The clips I refered to above had al sorts of profound thoughts about their meaning, but for me it was not obvious at all. At one point in the dreams of Andrei Eugenia met with his Russian wife. This reminded me very much of "Persona" (1966, Ingmar Bergman). Domenico is the fool of the village, but is he real a fool? His character has some resemblance with the character of Johannes Borgen in "Ordet" (1955, Carl Theodor Dreyer). In general the function of the character of Johannes was more clear to me than that of Domenico. Nevertheless there is one wonderful scene with Domenico. Domenico has kept his family inside his house for seven years because he is expecting the end of the World. After they are freed by local police his young son runs away and Domenico runs after him. In the beginning of the scene it is obvious that Domenico is trying to catch the boy. After a while this hunt gradually evolves in accompanying the boy in his voyage of discovery. A very beautiful scene indeed.

The way to appreciate "Nostalgia" may be to give up explaining and to start enjoying the beauty of the images. Images often with a lot of fog and certainly not the images you would find in a tourist travel guide of Tuscany, but beautiful all the same. Perhaps the most well known image is the one at the end of the film in which a wooden house Russian style turns out te be enclosed by the ruins of an Italian cathedral. An image also summing up the main theme of the film.