L'incinérateur de cadavres

Really unbelievable this film is stated as horror/comedy here on IMDb. Braindead is horror/comedy. This is pure horror. If Kopfrkringl's sick mind doesn't scare you, nothing does. This is a holocaust movie. But unlike Pianist or Shindler's list this movie is about cremator. About man who finds idea of burning thousands of murdered people every day very attractive. Director Juraj Herz have done brilliant piece of work by creating atmosphere of fear and madness so deep and believable. Because in fact there had to be some Kopfrkringl who actually done these things during WW2. This movie flows like honey (or some Lynch's work) with no boring spots and no disturbances in its rhythm. One scene traverses into another almost seamlessly. And in the end you can see mass murderer who thinks he is dalailama and you'll believe it's possible. That's why Cremator is REAL horror.

This film is everything else but the comedy! It shouldn't be funny in any case! It builds up an atmosphere of uncertainty and fear in an excellent way. The Rudolf Hrusinsky's lead character is superb. He is a kind of psychopathic personality blindly struggling for the maintaining order and meeting of commands regardless any consequences. In the context of Nazism it leads to destruction of his own family - his wife is a Jew. Not surprising that Kopfrkingl is on stage during every second of the film. The film is about his thoughts, reveals his mind processes, observes his perverted logic. A knowledge of the II World War history as well as Ladislav Fuks's (writer) genial artwork is helpful to understand this masterpiece.

This film is hypnotic. The soothing voice of the lead character, coming out of his cherubic always sweetly smiling face, almost lulls the viewer into a serene calm--if not for the fact that we know in our guts that this is the calm a cobra induces in its prey before the kill. This is, after all, Czechoslovakia on the eve of being taken over by Hitler, and the main character runs a crematorium. We know what is coming next. And yet, we cannot take our eyes from the screen; we are filled with foreboding.

Like the best of Fellini, the director, Juraj Herz, frames virtually every scene perfectly; a collection of stills taken from this black-and-white masterpiece could fill a photographic art gallery with a distinguished collection indeed.

How could the holocaust ever have happened in the middle of the most "civilized" culture in the world, the cradle of elegant music? How could rational "civilized" human beings have abetted this monstrosity? This film provides a fable that can help us answer these most important questions. But do not think this movie is some boring treatise on the banal roots of evil. It is a very entertaining horror film that will keep you spellbound.

Many reviews seem to miss the complicated layers of Czech culture, and hence view The Cremator only through western lens.

The politics and historical background of this film play heavily into the story. The director Juraj Herz had been a prisoner in a concentration camp and thankfully survived the Holocaust and went on to make movies. So the film was about the Nazi occupation made by a Jewish director who survived the Holocaust and later filmed during Czechoslovakia's oppressive communist regime (following the Prague Spring). Quite a complicated layer for Americans to swallow. The Czech people are a cynical bunch and understandably trust no type of government. Their culture and worldview (much like that of eastern Europe) remain a mystery to most Americans.

With that, he film was neither horrific nor depressing. It was a wicked comedy-Czech style, if you will. The cinematography was heavily stylized, almost Kafkaesque, and revealed a theatrical satire with odd moments of humor. The idea that this ordinary man with a mundane job could morph into a führer-like character illustrates perfectly the Czech skepticism toward humanity. The movie exposes the stupidity of people and politics, and its fatalistic outlook results in a clever tragicomedy.

This film of Juraj Herj, like Morgiana, has a decidedly gothic feel. Karl Kopfrkingl, the owner of a modern crematorium gets creepier by the minute. At the beginning of the film at a family outing we see a snow leopard, peacock, tiger, snake, and a lion - Karl makes a comment that "cages are for mute persons." Later at a fair everyone else seems to be having a wonderful time; Karl looks quite glum. But when they enter a "chamber of horrors" exhibit, he's quite happy and intrigued while everyone else is shocked (it reminds me of one of Charles Addams' cartoons with everyone in a movie theatre crying, except for one man who seems positively overjoyed by the cinema situation).

In a sense, Karl lives for dying - or at least lives to compassionately cremate as many people as he can, releasing and purifying their souls for another life. He seems to have a bit of an obsession with Tibetan Buddhism, carrying with him a tome on the Dalia Lama's palace and Buddhist customs.

It doesn't take much flattery and cajoling by Nazi sympathizers to put Karl totally over the edge of sanity . . .

Quite an incredible film, with good use of wide-angle lenses and closeups to indicate Karl's increasing derangement.