 Presented by Eric Van
“How is it that I was unaware of this film?”—David Kleiler, smitten and a bit stunned
(2006) In a hospital on the outskirts of 1920s Los Angeles, an injured silent movie stuntman (Lee Pace) begins to tell a fellow patient, a 7-year old Romanian girl with a broken arm (Catinca Untaru), a fantastic story of five mythical heroes. Thanks to his fractured state of mind and her vivid imagination, the line between fiction and reality blurs as the tale advances.
Everyone agrees that The Fall is one of the most visually stunning movies of all time; Singh shot it over four years in 28 exotic locations around the world, all scouted during his work directing TV commercials. Half the critics who saw it thought that it was trying to be The Princess Bride and failing, and it was declared Rotten at Rotten Tomatoes. It tanked at the box office, ranking just 196th on the year with $2.7M (adjusted for inflation). But audiences understood that the story was about the storyteller, his audience, their relationship, and the nature of storytelling and its power to change lives. They gave it a sky-high User Rating at IMDB. Sony Pictures picked up the disc rights. The Fall now has over 100,000 votes at IMDB, and its 7.9 rating puts it 14th all-time (minimum 60K votes) among non-animated fantasy films, just behind Groundhog Day and The Wizard of Oz. Critics have begun to regard it as a classic.
(Those who have seen the film should check out https://www.tor.com/2018/06/01/ten-years-later-theres-still-nothing-like-tarsem-singhs-the-fall/, and those who do see it should come back to this e-mail and read it!)
Eric’s living room is smaller than J.P.’s. If you are planning to attend, please e-mail him at emvan@post.harvard.edu to save your seat! |
