The Falls

Welcome to the highly personal paramount of Greenaway's work. His scathing documentary on general English silliness. An elongated, meticulously constructed piece of fabulous fantasy. A fantastic frivolous frolic. The film chronicles the biographies of 92 selected victims of the Violent Unknown Event, or VUE for short - a strange occurrence that has left people speaking strange languages and experiencing bird-related symptoms. All of the victims' surnames' begin with the word FALL. The bios are described by several narrators. Some of the bios are curt, others are fastidiously described. They are always witty. Examples being a victim who continually tells bird jokes, "Why do birds fly south for the winter? Because it's too far for them to walk". Others constantly drive in circles. Many of them have new talents, like spitting long distances. Some of the bios reminded me of Monty Python sketches, with the similar zest of absurd English humour.

It is a challenge to sit through it all in one go, and is probably best viewed on video in two or three attempts. Not recommended for everyone, but if you want something hilariously different look no further.

"The Falls" is an extraordinary piece of work. Nothing else comes close. The biographies of 92 victims of the "VUE" ("Violent Unexplained Event") whose surnames begin with the letters f-a-l-l, Greenaway's film is a mixture of the encyclopedic, the sinister, the silly and the plain mad. At 3h30, mad as Monty Python and as rambling as Laurence Sterne, shot and narrated in public television documentary-style, "The Falls" is designed to be exhaustive and wear you out; Greenaway himself has on occasion stated that nothing forces you to sit through, and that the film might actually work better if you just dip into it at random - "browse" was the word he used.

When I saw it, there were only myself and two other friends still in the cinema by the time the lights came up. All three of us were absolutely delighted, exhilarated in the manner of kids coming back from the Science Museum. Words like "mesmeric", "entrancing" and "fascinating" were used to discuss it afterwards, as well as "plain daft" (meant as a compliment, of course.)

Not sure if you'll enjoy "The Falls." It depends on what you want from your filmed entertainment, I guess. If you don't really think cinema should do anything other than tell stories that are easy on the brain, don't bother. If you love lists, however, and think intellectual challenge is entertaining, on the other hand, you're in for a treat.

One final note - whoever thought of recommending "Titanic" to fans of "The Falls" is obviously on some really heavy drug I've never heard about. What is it, and what other side effects does it have?

I'm a big fan of Greenaway's works and I jumped at the chance to check out this early work by the director on video.

I can't add to what others have said here except to say that it's an excrutiating experience that doesn't have enough humor to keep your interest for the full running time.

At its best, "The Falls" is an interesting and sometimes funny curiosity that points to themes Greenaway would return to again and again in his later work; at its worst, "The Falls" is a tedious experiment.

only one word comes to mind after watching The Falls. DIFFERENT.then again, Peter Greenaway has never ceased to surprise us (even those of us expecting the surprise). from victim 1 through 92 (including the few who are barely mentioned, along with a very convincing excuse as to why they don't have a full feature mention), the viewer is trapped in this make belief world of this plague that has struck part of the population. The entwining of some of the victims stories gives one a feeling of "now-that-makes-sense", the feeling we get when watching real documentaries.

the musical score left me speechless. and after three hours of listening to it, i am sure it will be stuck in my head all day tomorrow at work. the way it progresses from one victim to the next is fascinating.

i thought that i would struggle to remember individual cases. however, the closing scenes show a quick recap of the victims, and each case is remembered individually. i think that goes to show that the magical moviemaking techniques in this movie left a good imprint on my memory. the absurd tongue-in-cheek eccentricities of each case reminded me of classic british comedy. like the games in Drowning By Numbers, it was amusing to keep up with the humour.

after seeing several Greenaway movies, this one has left the biggest imprint. "The thief, the cook, ...." had a similar effect. however, the effects differ. one is of shock, the other is of brilliance.

I am not holding a drink in my hand at the moment, but if i were, i would be toasting Peter Greenaway in thanks for 3 hours of pure excellence.

I reckon that The Falls has to go down as the best thing that director Peter Greenaway has ever did. It marks the end of his early years when his work mainly took the format of short films. In a way The Falls takes this form too, in that it is essentially made up of a multitude of self-contained short films, albeit ones with an overall theme and connection. More specifically, it takes the format of a mockumentary, one that mimics the dry BBC style. Set in the near future, it centres on the fallout of an unexplained occurrence known as the Violent Unknown Event, in which a large number of people experience certain changes, including physical mutations and the ability to speak a variety of new hitherto unknown languages. The cause of this phenomenon remains oblique but it is suggested that it may be in some way related to ornithology. The film is made up of a selection of 92 mini biographies of victims taken from an official catalogue, detailing only individuals whose names begin with the letters F-A-L-L.

The first thing that is apparent about this one is that it is considerably more light-hearted that Greenaway's later feature films. It's full to the brim with absurd humour and the tone remains quite playful much of the time. It really has more in common with his earlier shorts that his later feature films. For one thing, it feels more like an underground movie with much less of a budget. The later films had the cinematography of Sacha Vierney to make them look visually immaculate, yet the more lo-fi approach here kind of feels somewhat more interesting for me. The format overall makes much better use of Greenaway's talents in that it allows for him to try many different things. Each mini-bio allows for a different approach and for a highly experimental film-maker such as Greenaway this lets him flex his avant-garde muscles quite freely. Of course, some parts are more interesting than others and there are some sections that are somewhat tedious. But pleasingly often he hits home with some genuinely fascinating left-field oddity and, in any case, if one part isn't grabbing your attention it will soon be followed by something else. There are many moments of visual invention of various kinds; Greenaway is able to dabble in differing types of avant-garde film-making. Helping matters considerably at times is the score from Michael Nyman, which is often very good; in particular the title theme 'Bird List' is especially wonderful.

Many of Greenaway's peculiarities can be seen here such as the creation of an almost fantasy world of sorts, replete with characters with names so bizarre as to have no connection with our world. Characters do things that go well beyond realism and the tone in general is one of absurdity throughout. There are also characters and events that both refer back to his earlier shorts and which will be used later in his subsequent features. It very much feels like this, along with many of his other films exist within their own little fantasy universe. And of course, his obsessions with list making, numerology, fine art and birds - amongst other things – are consistently adhered to. It is admittedly of an epic length but Greenaway himself has actively encouraged people to watch it in stages or in any order they wish. It's less cold and unpleasant than much of his more famous works and this makes for quite a refreshing change. For me, while it is challenging in many ways, it is the most interesting and enjoyable film he has ever directed and remains one of the best avant-garde films out there.