Careful
Internationally acclaimed cult director Guy Maddin (Tales From The Gimli Hospital, Archangel) scales new heights of cinematic strangeness in Careful, a weird, funny and unforgettable parable of sexual repression set in an Alpine village.
"Be Careful." "Never hold a baby's face near an open pin." "Never gamble with life." These are the bizarre warnings that the good people of Tolzbad live by.
But most importantly, they must never utter loud sounds lest they cause an avalanche. Sheepskins are hung in windows to muffle noise and the vocal chords of all animals have been severed to insure quiet and safety.
Sound is not the only thing that must be suppressed, however, For Tolzbad is a hotbed of repressed desires, Oedipal angst, and sibling rivalry. And, it only takes one young man's incestuous dream to trigger an emotional avalanche replete with suicides, ghostly visions, forbidden romances and murder.
Shot in bright, vivid color reminiscent of early two-strip Technicolor, Careful is a visually dazzling, dream-like, quasi-Freudian masterpiece that parodies the German mountain films of the 1920's and authentically recreates the surrealistic style of such famous German Expressionist films as Nosferatu and The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari.
Member Reviews
Great opening montage, rest of film so-so - duggie
The first 5 minutes of this film tell the story of a large mountain area where any noise can set off an avalanch. A location is found where "the echo cancels out the original sound" so that a community manages to live there. The community follows a set of rules based on being careful all the time, including such pearls as "Never put an open pin near a baby's head". It's all very intentionally ridiculous and silly, and I like it. It might also be commentary on Canadian timidity being based on its powerful neighbor.
Unfortunately the movie, after the first 5 minutes, does not build much on this. It goes into the standard Maddin territory of weird relationships and old cinema oddness. I wish he'd cut down on the silliness and try to use the expressionist scenes seriously.
Member Reviews
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Great opening montage, rest of film so-so - duggie
The first 5 minutes of this film tell the story of a large mountain area where any noise can set off an avalanch. A location is found where "the echo cancels out the original sound" so that a community manages to live there. The community follows a set of ...