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Genres: DramaHist
Starring: Rutger Hauer, Michael York, Charlotte Rampling, Oskar Huliczka, Joanna Litwin
Director(s): Lech Majewski
Country: Poland, Sweden
Year: 2011
Available Quality: DivX
IMDB Rating: 7 out of 10 (753 votes)
Behind every great painting lies an even greater story
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The Mill and the Cross (DivX) | Resolution: 624x352 px | Total Size: 699 Mb |
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Visitors Review
Vitarai (23 May 2012)
A Living Painting
I just saw this film as part of the 54th San Francisco InternationalFilm Festival in a screening at SFMOMA. What a work of art! A clearlabor of love, this layered re-telling of the significance of, andmeaning in Pieter Bruegel's masterpiece, "The Way to Calvary" is one ofthe finest embodiments of a canvas brought to life I have ever seen.Rutger Hauer is Pieter Bruegel, Sir Michael York is his patron, and themesmerizingly beautiful Charlotte Rampling is the Virgin Mary. Theunnamed figures in the painting (well over 100) are brought to life,and what a life it must have been in the 16th Century. Simple and withclear order, yet brutal and harsh. Not only is "The Mill and the Cross"a re-creation of the painting it is 16th Century Flanders (as Bruegelsaw it). The film also acts as a Passion Play, and given I saw itEaster Weekend it couldn't have seemed more appropriate.
lreynaert (22 May 2012)
a phenomenal reconstruction
In his brilliant short comment on Pieter Brueghel, the elder, AldousHuxley states that Brueghel's vision on mankind is still highlytopical. His paintings are allegories and show him as 'a man profoundlyconvinced of the reality of evil and of the horrors which this mortallife, not to mention eternity, hold in store for suffering humanity.The world is a horrible place; but in spite of this, or preciselybecause of this, men and women eat, drink and dance.'Pieter Brueghel's 'Way to Calvary' transcends its theme. It is aprofoundly bitter condemnation of the occupation of Flanders by theSpanish Catholic king. The Flemings are crucified or broken on thewheel, while their possessions are confiscated and their familiesdestroyed.Lech Majewski transformed masterfully Brueghel's masterpiece into animpressive movie. The reconstruction of the idyllic landscapes, of thecolorful atmosphere of the 16th century cities, of the epochal clothingand of the cold-blooded reign and the executions by the Spanishmercenaries are simply phenomenal, helped most significantly by abrilliant cast and a fantastic color grading. Lech Majewski'simpressive scenes, ranging from simple serene family joys to compulsivesadistic flogging, speak for themselves, while keen commentators, likeBreughel himself, critic harshly the savagery of the representatives ofthe Catholic king.A must see.
junkielee (20 May 2012)
The Mill and the Cross
Another Febiofest screening, Polish director Lech Majewski gave a briefintroduction of the film before the screening and stressed on howstrenuously the film had been produced, after a four-year span (mostlyfor post-production and animation) and ultimately mentioned that thepictorial sky in the film was specifically shot in New Zealand. (Thuswe should sense some preciousness or reverence?)The film reconstructs Flemish maestro Pieter Bruegel's masterpiece"TTHE PROCESSION TO CALVARY" in a fictional plot of the tribulation ofChristian religion, maybe I was the wrong audience there, besides aninitiative appreciation of all the tableaux's verisimilitude, the filmutterly eludes me. The re-enact of Jesus Christ's affliction is no more dauntless than MelGibson's THE PASSION OF THE Christ (2004), utilizing a medium of filmtechnology to reproduce a painting is not an enlightened idea, thoughfilm industry welcomes all clutches of experimentation, but does itworth all the investment to produce such a hollow replica apart from anovert religious purpose? Also the taciturn words also scotch the aidfrom a venerable cast, whose theatrical delivery is being mainlydelimited.From a technical angle, the gauche SFX is a far cry from top notch,some CGI blemishes could be well-conceived by any spectator, oneembarrassing moment arrives when all actors are frozen into astop-motion pause, all the horses could not stay put as their humancounterparts, their carefree optimism may betray that great paintingsare earnestly not in need of any reinterpretation and an overstatedlypedagogic preaching cannot service the aim of converting a person'sreligious belief, while the film clearly cannot differ idiosyncrasyfrom ridicule and its excess of self-esteem only stands for asuperfluous waste of energy, time and funds.
JvH48 (20 May 2012)
Must-see guided tour through Bruegel's picture
Many thanks to the Rotterdam filmfestival 2011 for screening thisguided tour through Christ Carrying the Cross, the painting by PieterBruegel the Elder. I learned a lot about the ideas behind it and theway it was set up. Seeing it explained gradually throughout the story,will let me remember it better than reading about it in a book.We also learned a lot about how people lived those days. A specialmention should be devoted to the parts where this film demonstratesthat life goes on, regardless of politics, war, and religions. We alsosaw many forgotten customs about bread, threshold cleaning, and muchmore that I want to leave as an exercise to the close observer.A dramatic moment at ¾ of the film is where the painter raises hishand, and life comes to a stand still, including the mill on the hillthat stops by a hand signal of the miller. It seems no coincidence thatthe miller very much resembles how our Lord is pictured usually, andalso that he oversees the whole panorama from his high position. Assoon as he signals the mill to resume working, the whole picturerelives from its frozen state.A large part of the audience stayed for the final Q&A. We got muchinformation about the post production effort required to get the colorsright, and creating the different layers to get everything in focus.Further, the film maker told he wanted to make a feature film from thestart. It was considered a Mission Impossible by the people around him.How wrong they were!All in all, a lot goes on in the film, much more than I could overseeduring the screening. Maybe I should try to grasp more of the finedetails during a second viewing. I don't think I saw everything thatthe film makers did put into this production.
sergei prikhodko (20 May 2012)
pretentious and tasteless
This is simply a fake.Nothing close to Bruegel whatsoever. Bruegel's colors are transparentand clear, lighting is soft. He applied thin layers of paint to achievethis effect. In the movie, on the contrary, colors are running rampantin the most tasteless computer generated sort of way.Bruegel's palette is certainly not bright. Maybe the director hadFlemish 15th century art with its bright colors in mind? But no, hedidn't. Flemish masters used glazing to let the light travel throughmultiple layers of paint to achieve marvellous illusions of tangibilityand depth. In the movie though, the colors seem to be borrowed from acandy store. Bold and artificial. Everything in this film is digitallyenhanced but acting. Acting is a pure zero while the visuals are a zerodigitally enhanced.The lighting indoors reminds of Caravaggio at best, but it's way toocrude. The first scene with the lovers is lit with Caravaggio in mindbut the director decided to throw in a bit of Flemish Art. Hence abrightly lit window. Unfortunately, the result is a caravagesquepainting torn and another one, Flemish, visible through a hole.So, what's this film about? Spanish oppression. Well, with no plot, noacting, no drama it's a worthless comment. About the recreation ofBruegel's famous painting? No way. The painting is shown in the movieand it's obvious that it has nothing to do with it artistically. Well,even though out of place, could it be on Barogue art? The lightingindoors is certainly meant to be Baroque. That can be true but than thedirector has not succeed. If you are interested in Baroque, there arequite a few infinitely better films. Even an entertaining andunpretentious "Alatriste" succeeded in recreating Velasquez way betterthan "The Miller and the Cross" in recreating anything.This film is nothing but European artsy pop junk. Will there be an endto artsy directors fooling the public? I gave the movie two stars because at least some viewers might getinterested in Pieter Brugel's art after seeing a "Road to Calvary"painting.
lixy (19 May 2012)
Gorgeous but flat and clunky
This gorgeous reconstruction of Bruegel's painting is ultimately moreimpressive than inspiring. There is no character, no narrative, noemotion in this piece and there's not that much analysis, either,despite the director's claims. I just saw it at the SF Film Fest, andthe likable and knowledgeable director gave a lengthy lecture a) on howlong it took to find the fabric for the costumes and b) on the loss ofour ability to read pictorial symbols. Sadly, the latter was notrelated to (or within) the film directly--that would have beeninteresting indeed!--and neither is the impressive (expensive)production design enough to make this work compelling.If you are interested in symbology and art history, see PeterGreenaway's, far superior Nightwatching, a film with a plot and livelycharacters as well as a fascinating view into the meanings (and the USEof meanings and symbols) of another famous Dutch painting, which,despite also suffering from some bombastic elements, still manages toengage the viewer in its own right as a movie.Also Derek Jarman's Caravaggio comes to mind as a film that usestableaux to evoke the painter of the title. Despite--or perhaps dueto--being somewhat opaque and strange, the Greenaway and Jarman films(and almost any of their work) are far more interesting than The Milland the Cross, because they use the medium of film to SHOW and notTELL. This literal and slavish reproduction of the painting wasimpressive in its verisimilitude but ultimately pointless andsuperficial.
Review total: 6, showing from 1 to 6