michaeltrivedi
Death and the Maiden is a good film. I can't say it's great, and I definitely cannot say it is bad. I have been watching a lot of Polanski lately, I am intrigued by how interesting his work is. He makes movies that I would not say are great by any means, but they just work very, very, very well. It's a weird dynamic. I can't say he's even my favorite director, but I know no other directors I can say are better.This movie is really good, and takes place mainly in the confines of a small house in Latin America. It does not feel claustrophobic, and the dialogue is absolutely great. The action and feeling you can get from an entire movie shot in one house is amazing. Watch this film!7 Stars!!
Chrysanthepop
One of the most outstanding elements about Roman Polanski's films is the tension in atmosphere and between the characters. The director has consistently succeeded in drawing the viewer by creating tension. Moreover, his use of dark themes and the lesser known add further appeal. After all, who isn't curious about the dark? Polanski also makes full use of what he's got, starting from the cast to the most basic of props. 95% of 'Death and the Maiden' was shot consecutively (in accordance with the script) which couldn't have been an easy thing to do if time and money are constraints. The film only has three actors and each one performs superbly. Ben Kingsley's disturbing and chilling portrayal of a sleazy sadistic doctor lingers in mind. Stuart Wilson is brilliant as the ambivalent lawyer torn between his beliefs. This is also a pleasant turn from the villainous characters he's more famous for. Sigourney Weaver is spellbinding as the former prisoner who finally gets the opportunity to seek her own justice. Polanski tactfully brings forth political and psychological issues without preaching to the audience.some minor flawed issues were the lighting. I felt it was too strong in places (where the only source of light was candles). It looks like there was some poor green screen filtering in a few of the outdoor scenes even though I don't think a green screen was used. However, these faults are too minor when viewing the film as a whole.'Death and the Maiden'is a simple but engaging and haunting story told through the perspective of three complex characters. It's one of Polanski's finest.
jzappa
Death and the Maiden is one of those darkly comfortable films where the opening moments are so intriguing and spot-on perfect that almost any continuation would be a disappointment. But, alas, movies have to be about something, and so slowly the purity of the situation settles as carefully as it can into the decisively paced story.Sigourney Weaver plays an intuitive and imperious specimen, a troubled housewife, playing her as a woman performing rather than personifying her traditionally feminine position. She is married to a renowned lawyer in an unclarified South American country. One night, a storm forces her husband, played by Stuart Wilson, to ride home with a kind stranger, played by Ben Kingsley. That is the exposition for this absorbing film, directed by Roman Polanski, a natural player in the realm of this story, based on a play by Chilean exile Ariel Dorfman, and clearly so. In the movie's lingering dark of the heart, Kingsley, crudely tied to a chair, will claim his innocence. Weaver will taunt him and interrogate him. And Wilson, her husband, will shudder first in one direction and then in the other, because this doctor is a pleasant and harmlessly polite man and a very intelligent one, and if there is a way for him to talk his way to freedom, he will realize it.This atmospheric drama is, somewhat, on the subject of real shame: Is this the man who raped and tortured her? To some extent, it concerns the character of guilt and its function in one's identity: If this is the same guy, maybe he has changed. Was he a product of the times or a victim of them? If he is guilty, does he atone? Is his crime forgivable to the human standard? Is the woman's husband somehow hindered by a male bonding with this man allegedly hostile to women? All of these reservations lie in wait provocatively beneath the brooding facade of this masterpiece, enriching and intensifying its insatiably vindictive story, which oddly enough is not so much about whether or not this is the man who tortured her, but about the unpredictability of Weaver's behavior, if she really knows what she's doing, if she has an idea of what she will do if she is right and he is in fact her scarring tormentor.The whole story leads up to a moving, unforgettable three-minute monologue by the doctor, giftedly delivered by Kingsley, so that we have to resolve not only the issue of his guilt or innocence in this makeshift trial, but the issue of its value. It is at this stirring climax that one can truly say that this minor string quartet-based masterpiece of claustrophobia is all as regards acting. Kingsley here can compare to the best of the rest of his work with his shrewd performance: He makes his character so smart that whether he's guilty or not, we have a definite appreciation for his struggle, and thus he not only fleshes out the character in Dorfman's drama but also heightens the drama without compromising anything about the script. Another actor, even one just as gifted, may easily have lacked the creative initiative to compel the character as such, a pivotal one at the core of the story.Moreover, without the Sigourney Weaver performance, the film could easily have been a lot less impactful. There must have been the pull to emphasize the years-pent rage of her character, but she not only brings so many other colors to this apparent maven, but understands that in a character who is seeking revenge, less is more, because less can be a whole lot more fulfilling in its jeering and mischief. Characterization is a side-effect that emanates from action and dialogue, and there are times, during the dialogue, when the film certainly clues us into its stage origins, when we feel we have almost been carried back to the tangible events she recalls. And Polanski uses the camera in these time-transcendent moments as a spectator, standing facing her and listening, just as one may want to even when seeing this performed on stage.The conflicted lawyer is credibly by Wilson as a man who would sincerely love to discern the truth, he is a deputy for the audience, the character whose feelings we share when he listens to Weaver's horror stories through Polanski's camera's eyes. But she and Kingsley both know that no jury can satisfy, or grasp, the personality of the circumstances. No more than the torturer and the tortured have shared that information, and perhaps only by changing places can they understand it, and that is what justifies her actions to anyone in the audience, even those who starkly oppose the concept of revenge.
gcd70
Polanski surprises again with this thriller concerning one woman's attempt to exorcise the demons of her past by brutalising a man she holds responsible for the torture she endured almost twenty years earlier. The screenplay from Rafael Yglesias and Ariel Dorfman (based upon Dorfman's play) manages to keep us guessing as to each player's next move, and as to the truth about Roberto (Kingsley).Sigourney Weaver is electric as Paulina, the woman seemingly driven to madness when confronted with this horrific ghost from her past. Her performance is at times truly terrifying. Ben Kingsley's turn as the questionable Roberto leaves no doubt as to his versatile acting talents, as he portrays with ease probable innocence, possible guilt and desperation all at once. Stuart Wilson is the unfortunate third party, and never has enough to do as the husband caught in the middle of this frightening situation. Editing from Herve de Luze is taught and cinematography from Tonino delli Colli is suitably confined.Polanski effortlessly keeps us on the edge of our seats as he at once jolts and surprises us throughout his pic. Yet in going for all out entertainment in his beloved Hitchcockian fashion, he has avoided the many contentious issues that this film raises. Gender domination, sexual assault, justice, revenge and even forgiveness are all skimmed over as Polanski charges through the subtleties of the narrative in favour of the thrill. Hey, who's complaining?Monday, June 16, 1997 - Hoyts Croydon
