francispisano-02767

While Andreas Prochaska's film is set in the Austrian Alps, all other elements of The Dark Valley are familiar. And the familiarity accounts for much of what is good about it.

Highly acclaimed in Europe where it garnered many German Film Awards, the movie failed to impress the few American critics who viewed it: a half dozen Rotten Tomatoes scores average an unimpressive 33 percent. It's neither as good as the German awards indicate nor as bad as its RT score suggests.

The best influences on The Dark Valley come from the cinematography of decades old westerns-particularly that of Vilmos Zsigmond for McCabe and Mrs Miller. Like Zsigmond, cinematographer Thomas Kienast presents leaden cast snow laden exteriors shot under overcast skies that contrast with warm hued interiors, and the images of both photographers appear to be illuminated by ambient light. Diffuse light falls on the broad snowy landscapes cut by dark veined ridges and spotted with deep brown clusters of buildings. Some of Kienast's interiors feature soft golden light emanating from lamps and candle flames which falls on the source sides of faces, receding into gradients of shadow opposite the light. Pale daylight, starkly framed in rectangular windows, backlights characters or dimly seeps inside to enable the viewer to discern people and features of the rooms. Yet not a single shot has the viewer straining to see in the near blackness that too many filmmakers present as realism.

Kienast, like Zsigmond, makes the cold a constant presence that in this film is utterly intrusive. There are no warm baths or comfortable spaces; curls of white drift from noses and mouths inside as well as out, making the constant discomfort of the characters palpable. A particularly notable white wisp rises from the brass side panel of a rifle as a warm shell is ejected.

Outside the cold is scarcely bearable. Stiffened hands struggle to grasp shotgun shells; faces reddened by the wind are tightened into grimaces.

The white of the snow also serves to intensify the violence, succeeding in making the effect of gunfire disturbing. Heavy splashes of blood pool and sink into the white and red spatter fans in awful droplets: deep red near the corpse, a tone of pink farther away The award winning production design is also first rate. The assortment of weapons, the overcoats and dresses, the tableware and more are not only authentic but exhibit use and wear.

While assessing performances in a dubbed version is difficult, Sam Riley presents a cool controlled reserve like Eastwood's Man with No Name while eschewing that actor's snarls. The principle antagonist as played by Tobias Moretti is effectively menacing. As in films like High Plains Drifter, most of the cast has little to do but appear belligerent or cowed, and this group does both quite well.

The plot is only mildly compelling: yet another young stranger gradually reveals himself as a man thirsting for revenge. And some of the protagonist's decisions are boneheaded for one who exhibited stealth and skill in the early reels. In one late scene, he has the entire array of villains at gunpoint and shoots no one. Another flaw is the use of pop rock in portions of the movie which is irritatingly anachronistic and adds nothing.

Watch for the action and the remarkable ambiance that so immerses the audience that we feel the bite of the wind and sting of the snow, smell leather and dank wool.

This film offers astonishing photography: soap bubbles look like iridescent lobes, butterflies and moths are presented like stunning neorealist paintings-the pigment scales on wings, delicate antennae, infinitesimal hairs are all rendered with clarity that will elicit gasps. There is also a series of images that morph from one of the protagonists into a cloud of fluttering butterflies of variegated hues segueing into what might be the greatest montage ever edited. Super closeups of wings flash at increasing speed, leaving the viewer overwhelmed by beauty. Complimenting the superb entomological photography are sweeping shots of lush gardens and vine covered chateau walls. We're this not enough, the interiors in soft intimate lighting would earn due praise.

And praise the film has garnered with many top critics assigning The Duke of Burgundy perfect scores. Yet with the feast of visual delights the film serves a story that is as dull as a tarnished penny. The lesbian couple repeat a kind of ritualized dominant and submissive behavior scene after scene with scant variation. The encounters are separated by repetitious scenes of entomology lectures.

The only portion of this movie that breaks the wearying dreary repetition is a visit to a woman who crafts fetish devices. This breaks the monotony, but it's difficult not to laugh during an exchange. When the submissive partner is disappointed to exasperation at learning that the equipment she desires cannot be fabricated in time for her birthday, an alternative is suggested. The character flashes with delight of the substitution: "how about human toilet?" The sensual scenes are my no measure engaging or erotic. Sure, the filmmaker is presenting the subject in a manner that forbids prurient interest. But it's difficult to think of a film in which the physical expression of affection is so boring. The relationship is static until the very end when one of the women becomes overwrought for reasons that the audience is unable to divine.

The exhilarating beauty of the photography serves to point up the colorless plot.

There are many laudable elements in Midnight Mass-strong performances, intriguing characters, and a bleak setting in which the viewer is immersed. By the time this limited series concludes, a number of descriptors are apt-turgid, confounding, dull, frustrating, and inconsistent.

It starts well. Plot lines extend and branch, then branch again. There are two primary stories: a guilt wracked alcoholic, recently released from prison for the vehicular manslaughter.of a teenaged girl has returned to his family home on remote Crockett Island; the return of Riley Flynn (Zach Gilford) coincides with the arrival of a young priest (Hamish Linklater). Flynn is received with anxious affection by his mother (Kristin Lehman) while his guilt is exacerbated by the resentment of his father (Henry Thomas). Father Paul, meanwhile, establishes personal connections through soft spoken comments about faith and energizes his congregation with rousing sermons.

The character arcs are intriguing. Father Paul and childhood sweetheart Erin Greene (Kate Siegel) work to dispel Flynn's self-recrimination and cynicism about a loving deity. And there is mystery about the priest. While the the faith of his congregants.steadily deepens, people begin to see inconsistencies in the story he presents to explain his replacement of his long serving predecessor.

As the character development builds, juxtaposing views on the nature of God and the meaning of human suffering are presented. The piety of Father Paul battles the scornful doubt of Flynn through intelligent layered dialogue. Too soon this strength of the program becomes a weakness. Well written as they are, every character from the principles to the minors has a soliloquy about her of his past or long ruminates on the justice of the cosmos. There are more set speeches in the first four episodes (and they keep coming; boy, do they keep coming) than in any four of Shakespeare's most soliloquy-heavy plays. This would be forgivable if Midnight Mass moved forward in its explorations of devotion and denial. The occurrence of a series of seeming miracles supports the trajectory. But when dark supernatural elements emerge, all the compelling questions are deposited on the shoreline like the dozens of reeking cat corpses that wash up on Crockett Island after a storm.

Character motivations which appeared pure do not merely become dubious, they become confounding. Even more irritating is the development of the horror elements. A central and essential tenant of a horror story is that the established nature of the monster must remain consistent. If a diabolical being can subsist on food, it cannot later subsist on only on blood.

While we can remain patient through the dense speeches in the first half of the series, when the characters continue to soliloquize as action becomes the driving force, the speeches become annoyingly interruptive. The constant insertion of prolonged commentary becomes analogous to a streaming service glitch: right in the middle of a scene, the screen freezes and the dreaded slow moving circle appears.

Astonishingly, the dynamic denouement is delayed by a discourse on the meaning of life and the nature of the universe.

Series creator Mike Flanagan gives us theological and philosophical inquiries that Marlowe and Milton might have admired and on the pages of his script pours pitchers of fake blood from a second rate horror film. It's as if he yielded creative control to a high school student who thinks graphic novels are better than the the best of Poe. The ghastly particulars tumble from the terrible to the laughable. Characters die horrifically. Then they come back to life-to die horrifically again.. . To come back to life again.

Midnight Mass is a gothic cathedral with a theme park ride screeching down the aisles.