Der Tag des Falken

Matthew Broderick stars in Ladyhawke in a role with an oriental setting would have been done by Sabu. There is a lot similaritity between Ladyhawke and the Thief Of Bagdad.

Our juvenile thief is Broderick who is about to be caught by the local troops and pay for his crimes when his capture is interrupted by a strange knight and a hawk. The knight is Rutger Hauer and he's the object of the hate of the local Bishop who runs the town.

Back in the days of The Code this film could never be made. One could not show a clergyman in a bad light and John Wood as the Bishop is as bad as they come. He has an obsession with Michelle Pfeiffer who is the true love of Hauer.

Wood if he couldn't have her, summons the powers of the black arts and curses them both. They can never find happiness because at sunrise Pfeiffer turns into a hawk and Hauer at sunset turns into a wolf and vice versa. Their time together is a moment or two at sunrise and sunset.

This medieval fairy tale is well done and the main players are well cast who also include Leo McKern as a defrocked priest. The sets are outstanding and Ladyhawke got two Oscar nominations in the sound department but lost.

A nice timeless fairy tale from Hollywood.

Let me start with the bad, the score it doesn't fit the time but I'm sure some studio head thought we need this to appeal to younger audiences of the time. Vittorio Storraro Cinematography is stunning, lush colors, locations, no CGI here my friends. The castles and mountains to the costumes and villages just take you back in time adding to this fine, fun, fantasy. Michelle Pfeiffer youth and beauty, Matthew Brodericks awkwardness are all well played throughout,to be honest he's quite funny. Rutger Hauer has always had mixed success be here his presence is fitting, rent it online or watch it in rerun you won't be disappointed they don't make films like this anymore and when they try so filled with CGI they don't have the organic immersive feeling this Romantic Fantasy Adventure delivers.

The leads are physically beautiful almost beyond film comparison. Their moral-spiritual characters match, which should make the film corny. The plot is preposterous, but the main characters, Isabeau and Gaston, prosecute their roles with such unfailing intensity you can't help but accept the nonsense. What is Ferris Bueller doing in medieval France, though? Perhaps the film needs some salty leavening, and at least he makes the plot work a little more efficiently. Overall, I don't have a rational judgement to make but a purely emotional one: I can never forget this film. It has haunted me since the first time I saw it. And that is all down to the pure intensity of Hauer and Pfeiffer.

As a former video store employee, I am proud to say of all the films I ever recommended, LADYHAWKE came back with all favorable reviews, and not once did anyone I rented it to take me up on my "money-back" guarantee.

No surprises there. Despite the production's troubled history between two studios (Fox and Warner's) and endless rewrites by an army of scribes, it still finds everyone involved at the top of their game, and early into most of their careers!

Rutger Hauer's bad guys were always more interesting and charismatic than his good ones, but his role as Captain Etienne Navarre was the noteable exception. In the best shape of his career both physically and artistically (with the exception of BLADE RUNNER'S Roy Batty), he painted the perfect portrait of noble hubris, tinged with the ache of unfulfilled love for his fair maiden, and the sorrow of an eternal curse that could never be lifted. Even Errol Flynn would've been envious.

Michelle Pfeiffer has been many things in her career: earthy, sensual, campy, courageous, but she would never achieve the combination of radiant strength and vulnerability that she did as Isabeau D'Anjou. There have been other actresses who have looked better and given deeper, more nuanced performances since hers...but it's a REAL short list.

When I saw the previews, I was pretty sure that the main thing I would like the least about this movie was Matthew Broderick, whose Philippe "The Mouse" Gaston was a character I was pretty sure would grate on my nerves. And for the first part of the film, he definitely does. Credit it to Matthew's likeability and talent that before the film's end, though, you're rooting for him as much as for the two leads.

And let's not forget an extremely impressive supporting cast: John Wood (WAR GAMES and JUMPING JACK FLASH), Leo McKern (the OMEN films and PBS' "Rumpole of the Bailey"), Alfred Molina (PRICK UP YOUR EARS, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and the TV series THE LADIES' MAN) and a wicked turn by Ken Hutchison as Navarre's nemesis.

For the couple, the friends or the family who want action AND romance, too, you can't do better, (and can always do worse.) And as far as the "music" controversy is concerned, I am a longtime fan of Andrew Powell's work back from his early days with Alan Parsons, and later with The Project, and I thought that the juxtaposition of the contemporary music with the medieval setting worked perfectly. This is, after all, a fantasy, not a historical record of true events! Enjoy it for what it is!

This movie, except for the "over-orchestration," deserves critical acclaim, as most of the comments have illustrated. However, no one seems to have addressed another element par excellence....the horses and equestrianship. Only one commentator made a cursory observation that Navarre's mount was a "farm horse." ... not so! That was a Fresian, one of the oldest breed of horse known and the one which the knights of old used for battle....try to train a "farm horse" to prance! Other breeds included the Lipizans, and it was the antagonists who rode them.

If one were to overlook the fine acting, the excellent storyline, the Romance (literary sense), and the romantic which tugs our heart strings in understatement, the appropriate comedy, the breath-taking camera work utilizing almost no special effects (but surpassing just about everything thrust upon us today), a horse-lover would revel in the production.

However, whoever (not the composers) was in charge of allowing the musical score, should have been barbecued at the stake for ruining an almost flawless classic. Never the less, this movie should not be missed...It will leave you in awe and wonder.

Marvin Cohn