I saw The Mil and the Cross too and found it simply stunning. Unique and unlike anything else. The movie takes place inside the painting, with the characters coming to life. You go into their homes, watch them go through the day, see life in those times in all its joy, the harshness. the clothing, the sounds of life, the quiet - all telling the story that leads up to the scene depicted in the painting.
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb <no_reply@...> wrote: > > There are occasionally films of such extraordinary physical beauty that > they transcend things like plot. Their visual images tell more of a > story than words and actions could ever tell. The images are a series of > moments frozen in time; they are, in a sense, like stepping into a > painting by one of the great masters. > > Such a film is "The Mill & The Cross." A collaboration between actress > Charlotte Rampling and Polish filmmaker Lech Majewski, it is allows us > to literally step inside one of the great masters' paintings, in this > case The Way To Calvary, by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. > > Bruegel was famous for his subversive visions, and his subtle humor. We > are talking, after all, about the artist who created a painting called > Landscape with the Fall of Icarus in which the only trace of Icarus is > one leg, disappearing into the sea after a flight that has gone > unregarded by everyone else in the painting. > (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bruegel,_Pieter_de_Oude_-_De_val_van_\ > icarus_-_hi_res.jpg > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bruegel,_Pieter_de_Oude_-_De_val_van_\ > icarus_-_hi_res.jpg> ) > > Similarly, in The Way To Calvary, even if you know the title, it takes > you some time to actually find Christ. He's there, stumbling under the > cross, but largely unregarded amidst all of the other suffering > and...well...just plain life going on all around him. Bruegel's humor in > this painting was to set the crucifixion in 16th century Flanders, where > he lived. Instead of Roman soldiers leading the doomed man to his fate, > it's the Spanish soldiers who ruled the Low Countries at the time, and > with no less an iron fist than the Romans. > (http://static.artbible.info/large/bruegel_kruisdraging.jpg > <http://static.artbible.info/large/bruegel_kruisdraging.jpg> ) > > If you're looking for plot, or for character development, or basically > *any* of the things you usually look for in a film, this one might not > be your cuppa tea. There is little dialogue and less plot. There are a > few characters, some played by major actors such as Rutger Hauer as > Bruegel, Michael York as his patron, and Charlotte Rampling as the > Virgin Mary, but it's almost as if each was a "three-dimensionalization" > of the painting and its genesis, not fully-fleshed-out movie characters > per se. And if you're Catholic and looking for the blood and gore and > emotion you associate with the crucifixion itself, or feel-good woo woo > surrounding the cosmic importance of that moment, go rent Mel Gibson's > "The Passion of the Christ" or some other cheezy Biblical epic. > > This film is about art, not Christ. It's about how art is conceived of > and executed by those who have the vision to see it in the places they > live in and in the people who live beside them in those places. Who is > to say whether any of the 500 "bit players" in Bruegel's painting were > any less important than Christ or whether their lives had any less > importance in the cosmic scheme of things than his. Certainly not > Breugel, and certainly not Majewski. > > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzbbYinuTWc > <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzbbYinuTWc> >
