Pismak

One of Has' later works, this one did not live up to the other two films that I have seen by him, but yet it is an interesting sketch of one man's journey through prison and typhus fever. Our man is the publisher of a satirical magazine called Devil, staying in the cell with a magical safecracker and a priest-turned-criminal. There's not much happening in the film, and it captures what you call the research that goes into writing a book, as our satirist takes notes about the people around him in order to build a novel. The characters are sketched in all diversity and to an extent, typicality; and as the delirium of typhoid begins to smudge the borders of reality and fiction, the movie much becomes a story of the man's psychological journey rather than the physical one. In parts, the movie really pulled me in, for example, his imaginary escapades, and I feel the dreams, rather than the reality, hold the key to what Has wants to tell us: an account of the insecurities, politics, medical uncertainties and oppression of rights that made up our world during the WWI phase and the daunting effect that it had on an individual.