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Title: Tales from the Gimli Hospital (2000) |
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Review of Tales from the Gimli Hospital
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Comments for Tales from the Gimli Hospital
- Posted on 2005-10-26
A Hilarious Charmer
I love the negative review down below where the reviewer, in a embarrassingly humorless way, misses the point of this wonderful little film. Oh sure, Gimli's an homage to Murnau and Pabst and whatnot, but what could be funnier and more ironic than a budget self-consciously Canadian filmmaker paying homage to the European Film Canon (He makes lots of Canadian references in his movies). Maddin's films, especially the earlier ones, constantly hint at Canada's, uh, tenuous position in the European cultural mainstream. They are typically Canadian-self-deprecating and his genius is to make great movies with that. When ya got lemons...
Anyway, yeah this is a cheap flick but he makes up for it with incredible imagination, humor, and fantasy. Also, I really don't like the comparisons with Eraserhead--superficially just barely justifiable--but this film, and his others, come from a uniquely different place. Maddin's casting, for example, is entirely different than Lynch's; he casts like he's making an old mainstream movie, not like he's making the most disturbing thing imaginable. Your grandma could watch Maddin films and although she might be confused a bit, she wouldn't be put off by the characters. In a way, Maddin's a deeper and more complex filmmaker, he doesn't rely on weirdness for its own sake too often, it's more a matter of continuously subverted expectations. He's also tons funnier than Lynch and his black humor is far less ugly. Watch, say, Twilight of the Ice Nymphs and you'll see how far from Lynch's mindset this great director is.
This is also a charming movie, in a adult sort of way but absolutely not in a "hip" raunchy/violent modern way. I doubt any American filmmaker could have ever dropped the ego, the portentiousness, the self-conscious hipness, the icky sarcasm, enough to have made anything like this. Kind of like a fairy tale (What am I saying, it is a fairy tale, started by a narrator in Princess Bride fashion). I love this flick!
Score: 5
- Posted on 2005-01-20
extra good film
One has to know icelandic folklore, to be able to begin to appreciate this ingenious film.
the best Icelandic film ever!
Score: 5 - Posted on 2004-04-10
My favorite movie of all time
I've watched this movie several times and am fascinated by it. What makes it so terrific is its uniqueness and the wonderfully fitting music that is found throughout the effort. You'll never see another movie like this and I must say that you have to be a little "off center" to enjoy it. If you're looking for something different then I recommend you try it.
Score: 5 - Posted on 2003-11-24
why the hype?
This is ham-fisted moviemaking at its worst--or should I say best? Burdened by an impossibly cheesy plot which fills the movie with more dead-air time than your next laundryroom round, the movie is at once too insultingly imcompetent to be a homage to the great German expressionist films which supposedly inspired it, and too boring and poker-faced to be a send-up of anything but the director's own mediocrity. Go see any film by Murnau, Pabst, Ruttmann, or Lang from the 20s--or for that matter any silent films at random, whether Russian, American, French, whatever--and they'll be infinitely better than this puerile endeavor at self-indulgence.
Score: 1
- Posted on 2003-10-12
Tales From A Parallel Universe
Poor Einar the Lonely (another of Guy Maddin's hapless heroes) has fallen a victim to the disfiguring pestilence that has been dropping from a great height onto the Canadian/Icelandic community of Gimli, Manitoba. He drags himself to the Gimli Hospital, a strange place where puppet shows are used in place of anaesthetic and the 13-year-old nurses ignore Einar in favor of Gunnar. Gunnar is the occupant of the bed next to Einar's; Einar's initial jealousy turns to friendship... but as the two men begin to exchange confidences, a secret comes out that makes them deadly enemies.Although the story is set in "a Gimli we no longer know", there really is such a place as Gimli, and there is a real Gimli Hospital. The Gimli of the film seems to exist in a time warp in which it is always 2 A.M., 1930; there is a late-night atmosphere over everything, and even the sun seems to give off an artificial light. The production values and the overall look of the film recall the early days of sound films ("White Zombie", "Vampyr", etc.). Maddin has taken great pains to recreate the technical limitations of those old movies, right down to the scratch and hum on the soundtrack.
Imagine either SCTV doing a parody of Ingmar Bergman or Ingmar Bergman doing a segment for SCTV-- in fact, in certain shots Kyle McCulloch (Einar) and Michael Gottli (Gunnar) resemble Joe Flaherty and John Candy. There's a great deal of deadpan silliness to this film, but you can't help but like the characters (Gunnar is hapless too); there's no directoral irony that invites us to look down on the cast. This is a film that walks a fine line between honest emotion and kitsch.
In that vein, one of the extra features provided with the DVD is the short film "The Dead Father", which has its comedic moments but is ultimately touching and will resonate with those who have lost a family member only to have him or her show up in their dreams. It's a serious film with funny overtones; sort of the flip side of "Tales of the Gimli Hospital". The last ten minutes are especially poignant.
Maddin provides a rollicking, often digressive commentary; it may not tell you everything you want to know, but it's a lot of fun to listen to.
Score: 4