Faust (Alexander Sokurov) [20 points / 2 votes]
"Somewhere between a Rabelaisian paean to Earthly pleasures and a serious inquiry into the folly of man’s desire for knowledge, Alexander Sokurov’s Faust is quite unlike any other cinematic event I encountered in 2013. The film, which adapts Goethe’s masterwork, sees no difference between its high aspirations and its low humor - an opening CGI shot sets up an epic mythology, only to end with a blurry shot of a cadaver's flaccid penis. The film waltzes through a maze of life’s lowly pleasures (a bath of virgins, a drunken pub, mockery at a funeral), all in the hopes of finding what will cause man to betray his intellect. It’s easy to dismiss Sokurov’s portrayal of this “important” myth as the sign of a filmmaker who can’t tell good from bad, but even his obsession with scatological humor is sublimated into the great philosophical search. While certainly owing a debt to Tarkovsky, Sokurov’s most apparent references come from outside of cinema from the world of painting: Rembrandt in the lighting, Brueghel in his parade through the village, a Botticelli in the Venus-like portraiture of Margarete, and an ending out of Friedrich's "Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog." These images are both repulsive and rapturous, implemented through the garish colors of Bruno Donbonnel's boldly inventive visual palette. The film's billing as the final part in the director’s "Men of Power" tetralogy frames it not only an explanation of Sokurov’s interest in the root of fascism in the 20th century but perhaps also a sly nod toward philistinism. Ultimately, Faust uses its wide range of comedy, passion, and tragedy to give the sense of the failures of all men, not just great ones." -- Peter Labuza
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