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A Movie A Day: THE SERPENT’S EGG (1978) I wake up from a nightmare and find out real life is worse than the dream.
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with the newest October special horror run of A Movie A Day!
[For the entirety of October I will be showcasing one horror film each day. Every film is pulled from my DVD shelf, recorded on the home DVR or streamed via Instant Netflix and will be one I haven’t seen. Unlike my usual A Movie A Day or A Movie A Week columns there won’t necessarily be connectors between each film, but you’ll more than likely see patterns emerge day to day. At the end of each standard AMAD I’m going to include a recommendation of a genre film that is either one of my personal favorites or too good of a double feature with the AMAD title to pass up a mention.]
You know, having seen THE SEVENTH SEAL from Ingmar Bergman I had high hopes for a film that was supposed to dip into surreal horror. I mean, just watch THE SEVENTH SEAL, considered to be one of the best dramas of all time, and it’s full of creepy shit. Bergman, like Lynch, knows how to show us that fuzzy world just out of sight, only caught in peripheral glimpses by us on a day to day basis.
But THE SERPENT’S EGG isn’t what I was hoping for. It might very well be a case of expectation fucking my first viewing of this film… or the movie could just be a slow, unfocused mess. One of those is the right answer.
The elements are there. Bergman has a great setting: Berlin in the ‘20s, a broken, poverty-stricken post-war hellhole. It was conditions like these that allowed Hitler’s rise to power a decade later. What a great setting for some trippy, surreal horror, even horror that borders on drama.
Our main character is Abel Rosenberg, an American Jew and ex-circus performer living in Berlin. David Carradine plays the lead and delivers a good, understated, internal performance. His character has everything stripped from him, bit by bit throughout the movie, as he finds himself closer and closer to solving a mystery he’s not even investigating.
The dude’s a drunk, but contented… until he walks into his apartment and finds his brother with a gun in his hand and his brains Pollocking the wall behind him.
Liv Ullman is the other main character, his brother’s estranged wife that Carradine soon finds comfort with. But something’s going on. People surrounding Carradine are dying, putting the attention of the local, abusive police department on him. Of course it doesn’t help that he’s Jewish.
I’ll give this to the movie… the final 15 minutes are really solid, even if 10 of those minutes is one long exposition scene by a German scientist explaining the movie for us. And there’s a scene where Carradine visits the weirdest hooker room ever, but if I’m honest the movie on the whole bored me to tears.
Like I said earlier that might be explained by anticipation of a different type of movie. This isn’t really a horror movie, but a weird romantic drama with a twist of the macabre thrown in. I found myself lost more than I wanted to. Scenes just seemed to drag on and didn’t lead anywhere.
I could have taken a MULHOLLAND DRIVE type movie, something with a creepy tone that has one good “What the fuck!?!” moment, but what I got was a slow burn that leads to a dude talking in a room for 10 minutes.
Carradine does a fine job and Ullman is good, too. Everybody’s good, with a particular spotlight on Heinz Bennet who plays the German scientist with the big speech. It’s a very good performance, almost Christophe Waltz-ish if I may be so bold.
But damn there’s a lot of waiting to do here. I don’t think I could recommend this as anything but a curiosity.
Final Thoughts: A lot of the pieces to an overall great puzzle are there. The acting, the production design, the setting and the story we get at the end, but it could have been done so much better. Maybe I’m just being a prude and wanting more entertainment from something that was more aimed at being an art film, but them’s my feelings.
If you want an example of the kind of movie I was expecting you can go no further than one of the all time classic slow-build surreal horror movies:
Nicolas Roeg’s DON’T LOOK NOW is a hugely suspenseful, atmospheric “fuck you” of a movie.
The flick is about an American couple (Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie) living in Venice trying to put some distance between themselves and the death of their young daughter. An elderly psychic claims the spirit of their daughter is near them and sure enough they start seeing glimpses of a red-coated child around the city.
These sightings are breaking down their carefully rebuilt life… How could their dead as dead can be daughter be in this city? Is it her spirit? Is it just another child in a similar red coat?
To make matters worse a series of murders occurring in Venice might be related to this vision.
Roeg’s use of sound in this movie is incredible. The finale will freak you out, guaranteed, but more than the visuals just watch how Roeg builds tension using nothing but the footfalls of Sutherland chasing his daughter’s apparition through the foggy canals and alleyways of Venice.
The performances are all top notch as well. Everything’s working in this picture. It’s awesome. If you haven’t seen it, it comes as a very high recommendation from me.
Here are the next week’s worth of AMAD titles:
Saturday, October 24th: THE SWARM (1978)
Sunday, October 25th: THE FLESH AND THE FIENDS (1960)
Monday, October 26th: COUNT YORGA, VAMPIRE (1970)
Tuesday, October 27th: THE SADIST (1963)
Wednesday, October 28th: CHRISTMAS EVIL (1980)
Thursday, October 29th: WHATEVER HAPPENED TO AUNT ALICE? (1969)
Friday, October 30th: WHO SAW HER DIE? (1972)
As you can see I made an executive decision and replaced Devil Doll with Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice? From what I undertand I am dodging a bullet.
Okay, got Friday done, onto The Swarm! It’s already been watched, but I'm exhausted. Will write it up when I awake!
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
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AMAD Halloween Spectacular 2009:
October 1st: Nothing But The Night (& The Wicker Man)
October 2nd: Beware! Children At Play (& The Devil Times Five)
October 3rd: Cameron’s Closet (& Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood)
October 4th: Afraid of the Dark (& The Lady In White)
October 5th: The Pit (& The Gate)
October 6th: Brain Damage (& Basket Case)
October 7th: Brain Dead (& Braindead, aka Dead Alive)
October 8th: Visiting Hours (& Dressed To Kill)
October 9th: Macabre (& The Beyond)
October 10th: Private Parts (& Eating Raoul)
October 11th: Road Games (& Duel)
October 12th: Dead End Drive-In (& Repo Man)
October 13th: Psychic Killer (& Alone In The Dark)
October 14th: The Body Snatcher (& Son of Frankenstein)
October 15th: The Leopard Man (& The Ghost and The Darkness)
October 16th: Wolfen (& Cujo)
October 17th: Madhouse (& Happy Birthday To Me)
October 18th: The House With The Laughing Windows (& Deep Red)
October 19th: The Spiral Staircase (& Eyes of a Stranger)
October 20th: Demon Seed (& Inside)
October 21st: Stagefright (& Phantom of the Paradise)
October 22nd: Dead of Night (’77) (& Twilight Zone: The Movie)
Click here for the full 215 movie run of A Movie A Day!
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an old SCTV with Joe Flaherty as Count Floyd, host of Monster Horror Chiller Theater, showing Bergman's _Hour of The Wolf_ under the mistaken impression that it's a werewolf film. "Pretty scary, eh, boys and girls?"
Don't mean to imply you're a vulgarian like Floyd, not if you love _Don't Look Now_ & _The Seventh Seal_ ; just a slight similarity there in dashed expectations.
Oh,and by the way, first. (Glad I got that out of my system finally.) -
Check out FACE TO FACE to see the single finest female acting performance of all time by Liv Ullman.
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Seriously, I respect Bergman to no end...but I've seen each of his movies in recent years...AFTER I have endured all the particular critical hype for each one. This means with each viewing I have gone in with a preconceived notion based on MY interpretation of what the critics say about the movie...and it is always WAAAAAY offbase. This usually means I miss something important because I'm looking too intently for some other thing that's miles away from the movie I'm actually watching. It takes me awhile to re-evaluate and then "get" the movie...but when I do...I see the brilliance that the critics ham-fistedly nearly ruin. Take "virgin spring" for instance...I think the water flows because Odin has received his virgin sacrifice...not because the Christian God was showing mercy on the family. That's some dark, scary shit to consider....
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WHAT!?!?????? WHY????? HUGO HUGOOOOOOOO
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...I never saw "Serpent's Egg," but I did want to say that "Don't Look Now", in addition to being a beautfully photographed film that creates an powerfully eerie, foreboding mood, has one of the most erotic scenes I've ever encountered in a movie. More, this scene features a _married_ couple, which is something of a rarity with hot sex scenes in the movies. For my money, the easy familiarity they show in the scenes of them helping each other get dressed, intercut with flashbacks to the sex they just enjoyed, creates a feeling of intimacy not quite like any other movie sex I'm aware of. I know, this series of films is building up to Halloween, not Valentine's, but everyone always talks (truthfully) about how creepy this one is, and hardly mentions this other aspect to it. Just wanted to redress the imbalance. (And for the record, I've never been married; maybe that's why I like the scene so, for its promise that great sex in marriage doesn't stop with the honeymoon, at least not if you're married to Julie Christie.)
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Methinks you may have your priorities mixed up a bit there, Quint.
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Quint, The Serpent's Egg isn't supposed to be any of the things you wanted it to be.
And what's with people always needing a WTF moment in film? Bergman films are thoughtful and sometimes shocking to those because of it, but they're not gimmicky pieces that need twists to work on their own nor are they intended to shock you.
Granted, The Serpent's Egg isn't one of his better films, but it's highly underrated. I'm wondering if that had anything to do with your review Quint... You said you were bored with it, and I can understand that if you're not used to old European art-house films, but honestly, The Seventh Seal is JUST as slow... the difference is that everybody is expected to love the Seventh Seal while the Serpent's Egg doesn't have 1000 critics backing it up telling you that you HAVE to like it.
Anyway, if you're still interested in Bergman, you'd probably prefer The Hour of the Wolf. It doesn't have a huge WTF moment, but generally speaking, the whole thing is kind of WTF if you know what I mean. -
Don't get me wrong Max, I LOVE Roeg and Don't Look Now may have been better than The Serpent's Egg, but when it comes down to guessing whether a Bergman film or a Roeg film will be better, Bergman is always the safer bet if you haven't seen either film.
Bergman has more GREAT films under his belt than Roeg has films in general. -
Great flick! To this day I always do a double take if I see someone in a red coat. Haven't seen SERPENT'S EGG yet, but based on your description I guess I'll wait on that one for a while.
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My expectation wasn't pulled from nothing. From the back of the DVD - "a hell on earth with a power few other could match." They also use the words "horrors," "frightening" and "psychological thriller."Seventh Seal is slow, but feels complete and everything I expected of it. I fully admit in my review that my expectations could have a lot to do with my opinion of this film. Like every other film anybody ever sees in their life, expectation plays a part, even if it's as simple as expecting a genre or star.Max, I'm not sure I've stated clearly enough what the second feature is in these reviews. Don't Look Now is in no way a back-up film to The Serpent's Egg. I'm doing my typical AMAD, a movie I haven't seen (Serpent's Egg) and following that up with a recommendation title, a movie I love (Don't Look Now)... or at the very least something I have seen that would make a good pairing with the AMAD. Claro?
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Heh.. maybe I'm just better at reading dvd box summaries than you. BTW, I own that same DVD (and the boxset it comes in) and I'm aware of what is says, I just never really take those descriptions to heart becase I know they're more concerned with you buying the DVD than giving an accurate description. Bergman films are slow & meditative and nobody wants to advertise a film that way. Generally speaking, I just read about the plots and ignore descriptions of mood (e.g., scary, tense, heartbreaking, disturbing etc.); then I think about the director and form my own expectations. I mean honestly, if you read the descriptions for the original Nosferatu, you'd be lead to think it's terrifying... it's not; it's a silent, dated picture about a dracula story. Again though, do yourself a favor and watch Hour of the Wolf... and don't read the back of the box either.
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Now you have to lie in it! You put Devil Doll back on the list right now young man!
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Serpent's Egg is just not a very good movie; even Bergman said it was terrible, lacking drama and believability.
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That's not saying much since he pretty much attacked his entire career except for 3 films
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Oct 25, 2009 6:53:55 AM CDT
A slow burn that leads to a dude talking in a room for 10 minute
by manos
So that's where they got Matrix reloaded from.
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Hit up Persona and Hour of the Wolf. Two of my favorite horror movies... period. I saw Persona last summer in the dark and it felt like I was 14 (instead of 24) watching Jacob's Ladder for the first time. That shit is some satisfyingly intelligent horror for you. Bergman at his best.
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I watched it one night around 1am, was not a happy bunny. A must see.
Serpent's Egg is just a bad film. Not even bergman could hit it out of the park every time. -
Spellbinder, The Manitou, Wicksboro Incident, Combat Shock, The Stendhal Syndrome, Teeth, Society, The Entity, The Burning, The Prophecy, Ted Bundy, Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon, and Saw VI. That's right! I saw S6 and Paranormal Activity the same day, and Saw VI was far more sophisticated than PA, which had some atmospheric horror sprinkled in between CONSTANT scenes of the guy trying to get his girlfriend to flash the camera, show some skin, ANYTHING. Saw VI is about an insurance claims adjustor, who makes a living denying people life saving treatments, getting his fucking karma FED THE FUCK BACK TO HIM FOR TWO WHOLE HOURS!!!
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looks like Donald Sutherland is groping the girl while simultaneously trying to eat her brains.
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Wear a diaper. You'll pee on yourself howling at the screen.
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It just is.
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You should have used the other David Carradine serpent movie "Q The Winged Serpent" to follow up this one. Great Larry Cohen movie. Dont Look Now would have been better after Demon Seed.
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the sex scene in Dont Look Now.
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that decent horror flick with Demi Moore and the coming end of days.
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It seems to me that you're implying the only Bergman film you've seen before Serpents Egg is The Seventh Seal... How can you claim to know anything about cinema when you've only seen two films by such an iconic filmmaker. if its a horror film you want, then you should probably watch "The Hour of the Wolf"
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It seems to me that you're implying the only Bergman film you've seen before Serpents Egg is The Seventh Seal... How can you claim to know anything about cinema when you've only seen two films by such an iconic filmmaker. if its a horror film you want, then you should probably watch "The Hour of the Wolf"
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...looks like Sutherland is attempting to eat the girl's skull while feeling up in her skirt. ::shudder::
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I always found it to be a mix of genres with a fairly whimsical ending, though I may be misreading it. Bergman did not ONLY do somber, dark pictures - take for example "Smiles Of A Summer Night." I think you need more of an education in Bergman before you hit "The Serpent's Egg," which is admittedly a lesser film but I think still very interesting. And the less said about you only just seeing "Don't Look Now" THIS WEEK, the better. What have you been doing all your life?
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Sick fuckers, the lot 'o youse.
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Bergman. I haven't actually seen a good print of 'The Serpent's Egg' — I had a bad vhs from the 80's discount bin or something. Great to see David Carradine working with Bergman.And, I LOVE Nic Roeg's work. "Don't Look Now" is one of the best of the seventies.
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How can I spell it out so it's not confusing? I've said it in the article and in an earlier talkback.. Don't Look Now is a movie I love and have seen before as all my recommendation titles are. I probably saw Don't Look Now after hearing Guillermo del Toro rave about it on a panel when I was a teenager.That said, I have seen very little Bergman. His feels always feel like homework to me, which isn't a bad thing, but when I think of all the super entertaining great cinema (the noirs, Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire musicals, etc.) I haven't seen yet those tend to slip in front of the queue.
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Owww, what an odd couple THAT makes.
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I can't remember it very well, but I predict that you'll think it sucks.
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That you decided not to review?
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viewing of Manos.
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