07-11-2016, 10:54 PM
Over the course of three hours, a cast of thousands finally run out of bodily fluids.
Hard to Be a God is based on the novel of the same name by the noted science fiction Strugastky brothers.
Another of their novels, Roadside Picnic, was brought to the big screen by Andrei Tarkovsky back in 1979. Titled Stalker, it was a dark and dreary affair, but powerfully effecting. For Hard to Be a God, Aleksei German takes the directorial reins and delivers an even darker and more dreary Strugatsky vision.
Hard to Be a God is a stunning achievement of snotting, spitting, puking, pissing, shitting, bleeding and evisceration in long and brilliantly choreographed scenes packed with grotesque characters going about their daily lives. The setting is medieval, but on another world. Mud fills the streets, every surface seems festooned with sticky ejecta, and there's always drizzle or downpours. This is one truly disgusting setting that just never relents. There's a slow and steady stream of dialog, and though the subtitles are in very good English, they're of little help in understanding what the hell is going on.
Somewhere in the middle of this ghastly abomination of a movie, there is a sex scene. A woman strips down and the protagonist gets it on with her. While this really is a welcome respite from the otherwise unrelenting bodily-fluid-spewing assault on the senses, still, it is disturbing enough in its own right to have convinced me never again to have sex.
Ever.
The Strugatsky brothers really need to stop inspiring film treatments of their work. The fact that they are now both dead gives me hope.
Hard to Be a God is based on the novel of the same name by the noted science fiction Strugastky brothers.
Another of their novels, Roadside Picnic, was brought to the big screen by Andrei Tarkovsky back in 1979. Titled Stalker, it was a dark and dreary affair, but powerfully effecting. For Hard to Be a God, Aleksei German takes the directorial reins and delivers an even darker and more dreary Strugatsky vision.
Hard to Be a God is a stunning achievement of snotting, spitting, puking, pissing, shitting, bleeding and evisceration in long and brilliantly choreographed scenes packed with grotesque characters going about their daily lives. The setting is medieval, but on another world. Mud fills the streets, every surface seems festooned with sticky ejecta, and there's always drizzle or downpours. This is one truly disgusting setting that just never relents. There's a slow and steady stream of dialog, and though the subtitles are in very good English, they're of little help in understanding what the hell is going on.
Somewhere in the middle of this ghastly abomination of a movie, there is a sex scene. A woman strips down and the protagonist gets it on with her. While this really is a welcome respite from the otherwise unrelenting bodily-fluid-spewing assault on the senses, still, it is disturbing enough in its own right to have convinced me never again to have sex.
Ever.
The Strugatsky brothers really need to stop inspiring film treatments of their work. The fact that they are now both dead gives me hope.
I'm nobody's pony.
