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Lunacy (2006)
Rated: 12A
Runtime: 1 hr 58 mins
Theatrical Release: 01-06-2007
Synopsis: The latest provocation from surrealist master Jan Svankmajer (LITTLE OTIK) is loosely based on two short stories by Edgar Allen Poe and inspired by the works of the Marquis de Sade. In nineteenth-century France (albeit one full of deliberate anachronisms) a young man, Jean Berlot, is... The latest provocation from surrealist master Jan Svankmajer (LITTLE OTIK) is loosely based on two short stories by Edgar Allen Poe and inspired by the works of the Marquis de Sade. In nineteenth-century France (albeit one full of deliberate anachronisms) a young man, Jean Berlot, is plagued by nightmares in which he is dragged off to a madhouse. On the journey back from his mother's funeral he is invited by a Marquis he meets at lunch to spend the night in his castle. There Berlot witnesses a blasphemous orgy and a 'therapeutic' funeral. Berlot tries to flee but the Marquis insists on helping him conquer his fears and takes his guest to a surrealistic lunatic asylum where the patients have complete freedom and the staff are locked up behind bars. Described by Svankmajer himself in a prologue to the film as a 'philosophical horror film,' LUNACY combines live action and stop-motion, sex and violence, grand guignol terror and gallows humor, and a lot of animated meat. --© Zeitgeist Films [More]
Genre: Horror/Suspense
Starring: Jan Triska, Ana Geislerová, Jaroslav Dusek, Jiri Krytinar, Pavel Liska
DVD Info
Release:
Aug 2, 2008
DVD Features:
- Keep Case
- Anamorphic Widescreen - 1.85
Audio:
- Dolby Digital - English
- Subtitles - English - Optional
Additional Release Material:
- Featurette - The Making Of LUNACY
- Trailer - Theatrical Trailer
Text/Photo Galleries:
- Stills/Photos - Behind-the-Scens Photos and Illustrated Treatment Cards
Reviews
Wickedly funny and astonishingly conceived, the film is a nonstop cavalcade of shocks, surprises and enchantments. I loved every minute of it.
By turns absurdly funny, disturbingly dissolute, unnervingly claustrophobic, and caustically misanthropic, Lunacy offers viewers the sort of punishing pleasures that so many of its characters seem, in their different ways, to seek.
Svankmajer continues to push at the boundaries of convention, juxtaposing blasphemy and torture while mocking the possibility of transcendence.
A horse-drawn carriage crossing an expressway overpass promises a more subversive ride than Svankmajer delivers.
While Lunacy leaves you with the impression that Svankmajer is more expressive with cutlets than he is with his atypically human-dominated dreamscape, some of the images are doozies.
This is one of those deliriously unhinged movies that looks, feels and sounds genuinely insane, for all the right artistic reasons.
The definition of liberation as the act of being delivered from the hands of one lunatic into the hands of another who is equally mad remains universal in its political and social applications.
For all the arresting visuals, Svankmajer's morose depiction of the blurry line between madness and sanity is surprisingly pedestrian.
At nearly two hours Lunacy becomes repetitive, at first ingeniously and then with a slowly dulling edge. The meat parade ceases to shock.
Yes, the film's undeniable horror lies in the lunacy of filmmaking, not the story.
Fans of movies about inmates who take over an asylum -- King of Hearts and Marat/Sade are prime examples -- will be amused by this surrealistic take on the subject punctuated by animated interludes featuring, of all things, dancing meat.
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