A friend linked me to the trailer for this film from India (I think?). I'm not sure if the final product will be any good, but I'm definitely intrigued. The idea of a fantasized reality with a team of exotic specialists and Charles Darwin is just...too weird to ignore.

More information here.

After watching that trailer, my goosebumps have goosebumps. This is officially my most anticipated film in years.

There's no denying that the film is absolutely gorgeous on a visual level -- indeed, it's one of the most visually stunning films I've seen in a long time. However, there are many times where the film elevates its visuals too much, at the expense of the actual storyline and characters.

As I wrote in my review (I saw the film at the 2006 Toronto film festival):

The film's platform release resulted last weekend in a below $4,000 per screen gross, so I had feared The Fall wouldn't make it to my suburban arthouse.

Turns out I was wrong. I'm seeing it tonight, at 7:50, or tomorrow night, if events conspire to keep me from it tonight. Can't wait. The Greencine roundup includes many that echo Opus' take, but those bottom two "updates" -- from Kehr and Uhlich -- have me holding out hope.

Saw this Wed. night. I wasn't entirely sold initially, but liked it more upon reflection.

The visuals are certainly stunning — from what I've read, NO CG was used at all! Which is jaw-dropping considering some of the set-pieces. The story has some dry spells, sure, but without spoiling anything I think it works with the reliability of the narrator.

And tying into this, the movie does a great job of representing the child protagonist's imagination on the screen. One of the best examples is how Alexandria (the young immigrant girl) and Roy (the narrator) interpret the word "indian."

I concur completely -- brilliant filmmaking, not very entertaining as a film. Great to think about afterward.

So, detractors: What's the missing element in the film? I think "storytelling" is too broad when discussing the film's arguable insufficiencies, because that term also encompasses its strengths, wouldn't you agree? Maybe it's just me, but the much raved about visuals only work in the context of the fantastical tale. This is the closest I've seen a contemporary film come to some of the work of Michael Powell I saw as a young child. Those films -- I'm thinking mainly of Thief of Baghdad -- had images I recalled much later in life. There was a kind of artificial wonderment to it. It's also a story that is somewhat episodic and patchwork, I think, but everyone considers it a classic today.

The Fall is closer in spirit to Thief than it is to the adult world of Pan's Labyrinth, although there are some grisly moments toward the end of the film, and, most disturbing of all, the dying monkey, which would probably traumatize young minds more than any of the adult deaths in the film. But it's a magical film in many ways, and throughout nearly all of its running time, The Fall struck me as the perfect bridge between Disney animation and adult/teen dramas.

The movie is grounded in the relationship between the girl and the stuntman, and it's there -- not in the made up story, or even the visuals -- that the film rises or falls. I'd argue that it rises, that the relationship between those two outside the story that forms their initial bond is the best part of this movie, surprisingly affecting, if not altogether unpredictable.

And yet, I did feel like the film left something on the table, or never brought that certain something to the table, as the film concluded. Something -- I'm not sure what -- seemed to be missing, something that would take this film from solid 3-star territory into the 4-star realm. I haven't put my finger on what that might be, but I'm not sure other reviews have helped me figure it out, either. It lacks a certain gut feeling that separates the best of these films from the runners up. I feel like The Fall falls just short of the "best," although it deserves something better than the status of "runner up." The ambition and artistry carry it to a higher realm, if not quite the heights of Powell or Pan's.

I will definitely watch this with my kids one day, secretly hoping that this film will be for them what Thief of Baghdad was for me. If it doesn't take, I'll just put on my copy of Thief. They've already watched it with me once before.

EDIT: Hah! Just read this quote on the movie, from David Fincher: "It’s ‘Wizard of Oz’ meets Tarkovsky.” Beautiful!

I'm with you on the movie, Christian. I really liked it overall, but it is missing something, and I can't put my finger on what. I thought its strengths far, far surpass any weaknesses too.

Yes, I would agree. One of the things that's enjoyable about the film is its complete willingness to ramble down what amount to narrative rabbit trails that lead to confoundingly fascinating visual compositions but don't directly advance the plot. And that's the problem: the narrative gets sidetracked. The narrative obsession with "what happens next" gets pandered to oh-so-effectively in a Spielberg film, and I'm not a big fan of that kind of narrative efficiency; but Tarsem could have used an editor with a Spielbergian sense to help him make hard choices about what neat stuff to trim and save for DVD cut-scenes. "What cool thing are we going to see next?" overwhelms "What happens next?"

Diagnosis: narrative slackness.

What Greg said.

I think this is where the movie gets weird, and ties into the flaw that's hard for me to describe: I think the movie needed to be hinky with its narrative, but suffers for it. It's established immediately that Roy is a shoddy storyteller—Alexandria basically comes right out and says it—but the story continues nonetheless. This is Roy exorcising his demons, in a way (and trying to start a catalyst that will end his life, moreover; it takes lots of detours as a result.

Yeah, I was willing to give the narrative a lot of slack, considering it was told "on the fly" by a suicidal/depressive clamoring for drugs. I wouldn't expect it to hold together; the point is that it eventually won't, which will force the real-world resolution to the tension between storyteller and audience.

Of course, that doesn't make it traditionally satisfying as storytelling, does it? I'd like to think the filmmakers could have resolved the adult-child relationship while still delivering a bit more satisfaction in the story department. But like I said, I'm willing to cut them a lot of slack, especially because the film delivers so well in other areas.

This is a film with certain faults that will either become more glaring in time, or will evaporate, making the airing of these concerns look rather silly in years to come.

Well, I don't think "silly" would apply, because one's experience of the film when one sees it for the first time is what it is -- and has nothing to do with critical theory in the first place.

Un chien andalou, for instance, is probably studied in every film class; but you don't see it showing up at revival screenings because no one wants to enjoy it in the way they do, say, Casablanca. It's art, and has tremendous relevance; but it's a clinical oddity, not a classic of entertainment.

I can certainly see The Fall being studied the way we study Un chien andalou or Thief of Baghdad or The New World -- but I can't see it ever establishing critical consensus as one of the top 100 films of all time or anything like that. To get in that class, a film has to be both artistically challenging and conventionally entertaining. (Note that I don't feel the two things are mutually exclusive... but they are different things nonetheless.)

One angle on this film that hasn't come up is religion. What's with the title, The Fall, anyway? That has specific Christian connotations, but I don't think the film's title refers to Genesis 3. However, I'm not sure what it refers to -- maybe the stuntman's injury? That seems depressingly literal, but I'm open to other suggestions.

As for the broader religious angle, this is a film that features more than one shot of a crucifix at a hospital. What's Tarsem trying to communicate with those shots? I could go down the road of "sin = lying" but I doubt the director wanted to convey such a message. If anything, I thought the film might be mocking religion -- showing it to be powerless in the life of the stuntman, who longs to flee this life.

Any film with that deals with childhood innocence is open to other interpretations, of course. What does the religious symbolism mean if we focus on the childs'-eye perspective of the film?

There are numerous references to "lying priests," and the main religious character is called a "mystic." At one point, the film shows a "mystic" healing ritual. It reminded me, in those moments, of numerous films that pit powerful "native" religions against a seemingly powerless brand of Western Christianity. That wasn't so much my focus while watching the film, but with those shots of the crucifix, I don't think religion plays an inconsequential role in The Fall.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Just went looking for Christian-themed reviews and found Brandon Fibbs', who has nothing to say about a possible theological angle but goes gaa-gaa for the film, calling it the best he's seen so far this year.
Wait! Greg: Barton Fink? Beautiful! I love it.

Thanks... but did you also note that I mention both Darwin and the mystic? I'm pretty sure that one of the film's points is that neither religion nor science gets it right: that storytelling is storytelling, and storytellers would as soon do away with Darwin as the mystics... and yet embrace them both, as long as they know their place within Story. And what is the Fall of Man but a grand story embraced by multiple cultures but owned by none? Stories, I think the film says, help us deal with painful realities, while science would try to either explain causes or treat symptoms, while religion would try to find purpose in pain or promise some future or mystical relief. Darwin and the mystic can be features of the story, can share in the story -- but they can't own the metanarrative.

It's not only the stuntman who suffers a fall. The girl has a broken arm from a fall, and then falls later in the storeroom. And then, of course, there are all of the falls taken by various characters in the various stories.

Visually, I think this film was quite an experience, something that needs to be seen on the big screen. Kind of a darker version of the Princess Bride. But the narrative is disjointed, reflecting a story that was assembled piecemeal based on a bunch of cool locations that the director found during his journeys through the world. Then again, considering the film was self-financed, I suppose this approach couldn't be helped. Some pretty amazing locations, though, throughout 18 countries. I liked that the film utilized actual buildings instead of sets built on a soundstage.

I thought that the biggest flaw of the film was in the stuntman character himself. He was kind of distant and off-putting, and that kept me from being able to embrace this film. Even though he was playing a depressed suicidal guy, he didn't seem very convincing as such. I did think it was effective how the stuntman and the little girl incorporated themselves into the story, reflecting their own points of view.

The last sequence seemed tacked on, though, like it was from a totally different film.

i been watching for this, its directed by the same guy who did THe Cell in 2000 with Jay LO and Vince Vaughn and Vincent D'Onofrio so for those who cant wait
u might want to que it up in the mean time... great eyecandy in that film. I havent done a search on that film in the forums so ill leave it at that.

Tarsem Singh is a real talent for visuals to be sure...though this trailer has a bit of a cold Heavy Metal Comic book feel as if Jean Giraud aka Moebius had a hand in it or at least did the storyboards... and for me at least i cant put my finger on it leaves me strangly cold and im troubed by that as i think it might be a misread....
Perhaps it lacks Guillermo del Toro earthiness, the whacked sincerity of Gilliam or the quirky joy of Jean-Pierre Jeunet's shows..... for some reason it reminds me of a product one might see out of Bolly-wood (india) and seems to be just one big music video akin to Duran Duran or Depache mode.. I do hope otherwise.

Cut to the chase,,, In hindsight would u devote 2 hrs plus to see it in the theatre or wait for dvd?

If you're going to see it at all then definitely see it on a big screen. The visuals will definitely lose something in the translation to the small screen. I was lucky enough to be in Atlanta recently, one of the (relatively few) places playing it and I'm glad I saw it, I would have caught it on DVD eventually, and would have no doubt been kicking myself for missing it in theaters.

Oh, yeah... If you're going to see it, see in on a big screen.

Thirded. You may like the story (which I did, and am in the minority), but the visuals are literally jaw-dropping on a big screen.

I share your ambiguity about the spiritual messages within the film. The use of the crucifix and cross, the priest celebrating the Eucharist, the Christian nuns, the conversation about the Eucharist "saving one’s soul,” the sacrificial death of the monkey and then each of the heroes one by one, all seem to imply a purpose. But then you have the occult, war-mongering mystic and eastern references. The betrayal by a priest. The nun’s attention and attraction toward the movie star, etc.

My sense, as I came away is that religion is treated much as the references to other films of this genre (Princess Bride, Big Fish, Indiana Jones, etc.). There really is no coherent message. It is, as the screen clearly tells us at the beginning of the film, “Once upon a time….” It is a dark fairy-tale without any real message.

As I said in my review, it is creative, ingenious and disturbing.

As counselors, my wife and I both felt that we should have been paid to watch it – all the archetypal struggles with depression and loss being lived out in life and fairytale – was like a day at the clinic. But even then, it doesn’t understand its own psychological dimensions enough to give insight and direction.

So, as you can see, I ended up giving it a one star rating, not because it isn’t creative cinema but because it could have done thematically what it did visually.

Denny

Saw it today. An amazing opening credit sequence; I'll forgive the use of Beethoven's Seventh. (At least they didn't use Arvo Pärt's "Spiegel im Spiegel"—that one's worn out its welcome, too.) The rest of the movie is a bit of a snooze, though. Terry Gilliam did this sort of thing much better in The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, structuring the narrative as frames-within-frames until it becomes a joyful celebration of the power of storytelling, the plight of the artist, etc.

Love Charles Darwin's fur coat, though. I wonder how many of God's creatures had to die to manufacture it.

Audiences step up for Tarsem's 'Fall'
"The Dark Knight" has Gotham City. "Mamma Mia!" prances around picturesque Greece and "Wall-E" floats through the magnificence of space.
But for sheer extravagant settings, you can't beat "The Fall," which has quietly ridden its sumptuous visuals and fanboy (and girl) appeal to become one of the stronger limited releases so far this year. Helmed by Tarsem Singh ("The Cell") and distribbed by Roadside Attractions, the pic has taken in more than $2 million since its limited release in May.
Not bad for a pic that went largely ignored at 2006's Toronto Film Fest. . . .
Variety, July 25

Gosh, I thought this film was played out. Glad to read this news, but $2 million for this film is paltry, isn't it? Didn't it cost a fortune, although much of the expense was borne by the director?

I look forward to seeing The Fall again. It faded a bit in my memory after I'd seen it, but recently I've found myself thinking of it and possibly developing more of a fondness for the film.

Christian wrote:
: Glad to read this news, but $2 million for this film is paltry, isn't it?

Don't know. I have the vague impression -- possibly mistaken -- that independent films have been doing very badly lately, so $2 million might indeed be something to celebrate, especially if the film in question is as offbeat as this film is said to be.

I don't see the link here in this thread, but I have a vague memory of reading about this film before I saw it. It cost a lot to make, and the director financed most of it himself. I don't know that he, or any of the other backers of the film, will ever see a dime.

Boxofficemojo says the production budget is "N/A".

Greencine says the DVD is out today, and links to a nice House Next Door review:

It is an image-driven artwork, yet it doesn't behave in the way we expect an art film to behave. Consequently, it somewhat tragically exists apart, a film without a category, possessing neither the born-of-slowness mystery of a Kieslowski creation, nor the blistering authorial control of the Coens, nor Terry Gilliam's delightful, homemade props. The resulting experience is unique and thrilling. We are never implicitly told how to feel, when to applaud, or what moments to relish. Consequently, The Fall takes its place among an elite category of cinema: a careful artwork that doesn't advertise its own gravitas. Perhaps that's the definition of a cult classic.

Just watched it.

I kept thinking about Mirrormask and Tideland and Pan's Labyrinth, all stories about children who translate the hard, harsh events around them into a storybook reality that helps them cope. In the end, art is lifted up as something we craft to help us make sense of what has happened to us... and something that eventually calls us to stand up and change that reality. Art is both a response to reality's hardships, and a source of inspiration that can transform those hardships.

I *love* the idea that drives the fantasy sequences: that, while the story is told by one person, what we see is actually what the listener (the child) is imagining. It's her imagination and, sometimes, her misunderstandings, that provide the pictures we see. It was so interesting that Roy imagined an "Indian" and spoke in terms of American Indians, while the girl imagines a man from India. Sometimes the storybook imagery seemed too simplistic and exaggerated, but then I reminded myself who was doing the imagining, and just how much of the world she had seen, and it made more sense.

My only complaint is that Tarsem twists the knife for far too long at the end, in the "Will he die?" sequence. I wanted to shout, "Okay! Enough already!" and the anguish and suspense just kept going and going and going. Making that worse, the dramatic conclusion of the climactic fight in the pool felt rather arbitrary, without any kind of meaningful resonance. It was like, "And then, THIS happened!" I was hoping for something that actually seemed meaningful. It was almost exactly the same experience that I had at the end of Spirited Away when the whole adventure comes down to Chihiro making an out-of-nowhere lucky guess, triggering a celebration.

But otherwise, the film was much better than I anticipated, and I have Greg Wright to thank, as I probably wouldn't have seen it without his several nudges to seek it out. Fortunately, I saw it on a friend's enormous screen, so it was the next best thing to seeing it in a theater.

Finally... wow. The film's greatest virtue is the young actress. Were those scenes improvised? She stammered her way through so many seemingly spontaneous lines and humorous, completely unexpected outbursts... I was completely charmed by her. If her scenes *were* improvised, that would fit with one of the themes the film explores most fruitfully... the power of improvisation. As the storyteller collaborates, from time to time, with the desires and whims of his attentive listener, the story he's telling turns abrupt corners and heads out on surprising tangents. That's what I love best about storytelling... the power of the unexpected to reveal something the storyteller never intended.

It's hard for me to believe that this movie is from the same mind that brought us The Cell, one of the most sick and twisted things I've ever endured in a theater.

Yay! I was just putting this film down on my year-end ballot, and had "Little Girl, The Fall" down for Best Supporting Actress. I've yet to look up her name, although I knew it for a time earlier this year.

Glad you liked it. I really look forward to seeing it again, although the studio hasn't sent me a screener, which I take to mean that the film isn't being pushed for awards consideration. That won't stop me from citing it, although this film is probably a hair below some of my other choices. I want to reward it for its ambition, and the degree to which it succeeds in fulfilling that ambition, even if it's not the masterpiece I'd hoped it would be.