Age of Uprising: The Legend of Michael Kohlhaas.

Inspired by Heinrich von Kleist German novella Michael Kohlhaas, which in it self is based on the true story of Hans Kohlhase a 16^th century merchant who lived in Colln which today is called Berlin, French born director and writer Arnaud des Pallieres has adapted the story to concern an ordinary family man who earns a living trading in horses and only turns to violence when all other options have eluded him. 

 

Kohlhaas and his wife Judith.

Whilst taking horses to market Michael Kohlhaas (Danish actor Mads Mikkelson in his brooding warrior mode) has to pass through the local barons lands who seizes two of his best black horses as collateral for his lack of a transit permit even though as he discovers he does not need one. Returning to collect his horses and his servant Cesar (David Bennent), who has stayed to look after the valuable beasts, he finds that the horses have been viciously worked in the barons fields and are damaged goods also Cesar has been savaged by the barons dogs. Our horse trader then attempts to sue for reparations for both his damaged horses and his badly injured servant but the case is unfairly dismissed because the baron has a relative at court. It is decided that Kohlhaas’s wife Judith (Delphine Chuillot) should partition the ruling princess directly, but she is badly beaten and dies on her return to her husband and teenage daughter Lisbeth. In Kohlhaas’s mind his has only one course of action left to him – that is to extract revenge and search for retribution for the wrongs done to him and his family. 

 

Lisbeth must be protected at all costs.

Maybe a little slow and deliberate for some but in my opinion an admirable example of austere period drama, admittedly sombre and bleak but totally gripping all brilliantly acted out by Mikkelson and his supporting cast, which includes, as well as these already mentioned, Bruno Ganz as the main protector of the authoritarians and the excellent Denis Lavant as a Protestant theologian who is in a great scene where he lectures Michael Kohlhaas about the moral dimension of the action he has taken. When you have the privilege to witness such inventive filmmaking you realise that the demise of the movie is greatly exaggerated.

Will Kohlhaas extract his revenge?

Holy Motors.

‘You see many states in the film, from the fatigue of being yourself to the glory of re-inventing who you are” Carax adds, ‘There’s never any initial idea or intention behind a film, but rather a couple of images and feelings that I splice together.’[1] Images and feelings over storytelling?

The director Leos Carax appears in the films prologue where he awakens in a dingy hotel room, he goes through the wall of his bedroom, which is made to look like a forest, onto the balcony of a cinema overlooking the audience and watching what appears to be a large dog walk down the aisle towards the screen, perhaps a reference to the cinematic influences that Holy Motors (2012) contains. 

M.Merde

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could live your life differently over and over again? Well that’s what Monsieur Oscar does, he’s ferried around Paris by his elegantly beautiful chauffeur Celine in a large white stretch limo changing his appearance and character in a series of ten appointments all to be carried out in the space of one day. 

Kay M shares a moment with M. Merde.

Again Denis Lavant is reunited with Carax after appearing in all his films except Pola X (1999) and plays a total of eleven different roles including Monsieur Oscar and my own favourite M. Merde (shit) in one of the best and funniest ‘appointments’ he carries out, sharing this segment is the statuesque Eva Mendes who plays a model called Kay M. I don’t want to explain in detail each of Oscars incarnations because I feel it would spoil your enjoyment of these cinematic adventures suffice to say that some are better than others but all hold a sense of bewilderment and surprise and all are full of invention and energy.

Is it really Jean Seberg?

The movie is full of surprises, not many films have an intermission where a group of accordion players, including Lavant, play some stunning music whilst walking through a candlelit church! Not many movies give a worthwhile role to Kylie Minogue as a Jean Seberg look alike. Not many movies reference George Franjue’s Eyes Without a Face (1960) when the 75-year-old French actress Edith Scob, who plays Oscars faithful driver Celine, dons the same mask she wore in that classic French horror. Carax even uses the same once grand Parisian department store La Samaritaine that played such a significant part of the backdrop in his modern French fairy tale Les Amants du Pont-Neuf (1991). Even the very final scene where Oscar is taken ‘home’ after his days work and the stretch limo is taken back to the garage for the night, gives us further revelations that we were not expecting.

Celine with her face!

Throughout his career, French filmmaker Leos Carax has repeatedly baffled and shocked his audiences: from the exuberant postmodern romance of Les Amants de Pont Neuf (The Lovers on the Bridge, 1991), to the portrayal of incestuous love in 1999’s Pola X his last feature film, his latest feature is undoubtedly his most confounding. Carax’s film reads as a tribute to cinema itself, to the different worlds of which it allows us to become part for a short period. Conversely, it may be read as a melancholic wish to be able to live one’s life again, and differently

Holy Motors is a truly imaginative piece of film making that I will never forget. It will become a cult classic, discussed and dissected over and over again, enthralling some and boring others. It’s certainly not your normal narrative driven movie and owes nothing to the mainstream! The only way to enjoy this privileged experience is to sit back and absorb what is served up on the screen and what ever you do don’t question it, don’t try and work things out, it will surely spoil the pure pleasure. 

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[1] Leos Carax when interviewed by Peter Bradshaw.