Le repentir

A striking (and politically astonishing for it's day) act of self-examination, self-criticism and ultimately self-laceration of a film made in the Soviet Union.

This is a darkly funny, playfully surrealistic, scathing satire of the Stalinist era's turning the entire population of an empire into suspects to be jailed, exiled and eliminated at whim. Full of striking images and strong performances.

Told in flashback, it starts from the death of a seemingly beloved small town mayor who we come to learn played the role of a local Stalin. Likable and even playful on the surface, the more we see his ever growing darkness the more disturbing the film becomes, as he ever more readily destroys those who might be enemies, or are simply inconvenient.

This flashback tale is framed by watching his family, after his death, trying to deal with their own feelings of and denials of guilt, as a local woman, her life ruined by the mayor, stands trial for repeatedly digging up his corpse again and again.

Far from a perfect film, some of the surrealistic imagery works better than others, and some twists seem a bit like 'easy' explanations of complex behavior, but this is still a fascinating, challenging and unique film about one of the great horrors of the last century. And an effective cautionary tale about the power of a paranoid state.

This film was absolute genius and, in my opinion, one of the best films produced in the 20th century. It is on par with films like the Seventh Seal and Schindler's List in terms of symbolism and philosophy. The only way one can not like this film is if one does not understand it- which is quite possible, if one is only haphazardly watching it and is not fully engaged, or is expecting the film to chew up the messages for you and give you something simple you can quickly take away without actually appreciating the movie- then this is the wrong film for you. In order to properly appreciate this film you have to engage in higher philosophical thought and reflect both on the lives of individuals of the Stalinist era as well as your own era, since this movie is timeless. It explores human nature at its basest level, and what causes humans to act in the ways they do.

My only complaint about Tengiz Abuladze's REPENTANCE (English title) is that I am uncertain what was real and what was fantasy. However, since this was undoubtedly his intention, I cannot properly call it a complaint. Outside of David Lynch films, I have never seen more perfectly executed dream imagery than that of REPENTANCE; the beauty of these sequences is accentuated by the surreal atmosphere of the various dreamers' waking lives. The cast is uniformly excellent, the premise unique, and much of the dialogue resonates with beauty, despair and universal truth, often mingled with humor. No character is utterly devoid of sympathy, nor is any character entirely sympathetic. All is ambiguous, just as it is in our own so-called "reality".

This is a very good film. It works on several levels. I don't know whether this was intended by it's authors or no, but the general outline of the film has obvious Alice in the Wonderland (or Through the Looking-Glass) allusion. The confectioner woman imagines (or dreams about) a story of revenge and justice (a real cruel fairy tale adventure full of evil and good characters, colorful and strange images) and as in `Alice' right when the story gets kind of `out of control' (grandson kills himself with grandfathers riffle, son digs out the corpse of his father.) we get back to the cosy room of confectioner, from where our adventures to the past and future have begun.

It was really interesting to see the story of Totalitarian regime through this `fairy tale' angle. They make a lot of films that are meant to be much more historically precise than `Repentance', but most of them are flat and look more like TV dramatizations of some definite actual events than the works of art. And `Repentance' is an art-film in a very good sense of this word.

The closing sequence of Old Woman walking up the street (looking for the Temple - justice, freedom, happiness?) accompanied by heavenly classic music is one of the most beautiful film episodes I've ever seen.

Joseph Stalin's purges were one of the most horrific chapters in Soviet history. A famous movie about this period is Nikita Mikhalkov's "Burnt by the Sun". An equally important one is Tengiz Abuladze's "Repentance". This one emphasizes not only the terror visited upon the population, but the efforts to expose the truth and prevent whitewashing of those who committed the genocide. The subject is a man who shares physical similarities with Hitler and Stalin, but is based on Lavrentiy Beria (one of Stalin's acolytes). As mayor of a town in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic, he doesn't hesitate to persecute those whom he deems disloyal. Years later, a woman goes to unusual lengths to reveal the truth about his handiwork.

Not surprisingly, the movie couldn't get released immediately. It wasn't until after Gorbachev came to power that it got a release. I'd say that the ugly parts of history are more important to know about that the pleasant parts of history, to ensure that they don't get repeated. I understand that Beria was particularly vicious.

We don't get to see many movies from Georgia. I wish that I could see more of them. Part of it is that I like getting to see cultures that we don't often get to see, but I would also like to have more insight into their perspective on things. As the 2008 war made clear, Russo-Georgian tensions didn't end with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Anyway, it's an outstanding movie. While it is a bit long, the plot makes up for that. I recommend it.