Siberia

Love to have been at the meeting where Ferrara pitched this film and someone told him 'Go make it.' I love to say something about 'Siberia's' story but there isn't one. Well acted and I'd love to give it props for production but as far as I can tell it's just a lot of weirdness posing as something profound.

Well, I'm not the dumbest chicken sitting in the middle of the road, but I'm not sure what I watched. Is our main character hallucinating from the isolation? Is he dead & somehow we're reliving his past (or maybe he is reliving his past & we're observers). Did this bar in the middle of nowhere burn down? If so, what happened?

If my mind needs exercise there are far more productive ways to accomplish that.

Nice scenery.

I am not going to say much About this film. Because there simply isnt much to say exccept for Willem Dafoe Walking through Scenes that makes no sense. Yes I understand its all symbolic, but this can be done SO much better, also technically. Its one of the worst films I have EVER seen on the Berlinale. A real shame for Willem Dafoe who I love dearly. Abel Ferrera really went to far with it. The only redeeming Quality are the fantastic nature shots and cinematography in General. Everything else is just really downright useless, forgetable and boring.

In his attempt to film dreams, Abel Ferrara shows a nightmare. Although the images of Willem Dafoe in a remote and frozen place visited by characters he doesn't understand, are mysterious, the hallucinatory journey becomes confusing. Based on the active imagination that Carl Jung showed in "The red book," this representation of the dream world feels scattered and somehow more ordinary than it would have us believe.

If my dreams would be that boring, I would simply stay awake till I get some real trippy stuff going on in my mind. Verdict: pseudo-artsy-intellectual movie that achieved mainly one emotion in my soul: boredom by torture (if this of course was/is the aim of writer and director, they did well). Some introspective scenes including some nudity and violence don't make something good by itself, and even Mr. Dafoe's acting skills could not save this movie for me - and I really like some of his more experimental and trippy movies like The Lighthouse (2019, also directed by Abel Ferrara) or Antichrist (2009, Lars von Trier).