"Berberian Sound Studio" - directed by Peter Strickland
I've stated before on this blog that I have been to see films with little knowledge of them going in but with "Berberian Sound Studio" it is more true than ever before.
I knew nothing beyond the lead actor Toby Jones and that it was about a sound engineer working on an Italian horror movie in the seventies.
I wasn't even aware of what genre the film itself was - only the one within the film.
Hard to get a feel for its worth then.
In fact I saw the poster advertising it online, decided that I wasn't interested for some reason and promptly filed it in the part of my head that stores odd titles of upcoming movies.
It snuggled in there for a few days with "Camille Rewinds" and "Someday This Pain Will Be Useful To You" and I assumed that that would be the end of it.
Then I got an e-mail saying that I had two tickets waiting for me at The Academy cinema to see this movie.
So, having learned previously with the likes of "Your Sister's Sister" and "Headhunters" that the movies that don't really appeal beforehand are often the ones that become favourites I thought I'd give it shot.
Besides- this would be the only big screen showing and there was a free collector poster included.
The film begins with Gilderoy (Toby Jones) arriving at a film studio in Italy to take up a position producing the sound for a horror movie.
We won't learn his first name or much else about him apart from that he has a mother back home with whom he lives.
She writes to him of 'chiff chaffs' that are nesting in the garden and wishes that he was back home.
Gideroy meets the producer, an unfriendly receptionist, some foley artists and finally the film's smarmy director.
He records ADR using a couple of actresses and foley with a bunch of fruit and vegetables, carving knives and mallets.
He has a host of sound boards, reel to reel tape and audio machinery to mix, distort and record sound effects.
The camera lingers over the sound equipment in an almost lecherous manner, swooping across boards covered in sliders and along sprockets as film and tape pass through.
If there exists a perversion in which people find fulfillment in vintage electronic equipment then this film is these peoples "Deep Throat".
One of the aspects of "Berberian Sound Studio" that I found interesting is that the film Gilderoy is working on is never shown.
We hear the dialogue and there are many descriptions of what is happening on screen but we only ever see the production - not the film itself.
It's a fascinating twist to show only the production and completely reverses the intentions that most movies have.
Everything is behind the scenes with this one.
Clever it may be but it does add some frustrations.
The film being made seems part Mario Bava, part Dario Argento.
In fact it could be "Suspiria" that Gilderoy is working on.
There is much talk of witches and rituals and there are scenes of extreme violence.
One calls for Gilderoy to make the sound of a red hot poker being insterted into a witches' vagina.
It could explain why we don't see much of the film.
Certainly it troubles our hero who starts to become mentally unstable as things progress.
I use the word progress loosely because not a lot happens in this film.
It has much of the feel of Antonioni's "Blow Up".
Sure- the period and the backdrop are similar but unlike the great 1966 film it doesn't intrigue nearly as much.
Movies like David Lynch's terminally weird "Mulholland Drive" get away with not ultimately revealing or resolving much by being fascinating and hypnotic.
That film drives us forward on the promise of a mystery solved and even if it fails to do that for most viewers (I include myself) the trip is nonetheless entertaining enough on its own.
In the case of "Berberian Sound Studio" whatever build up there is is never paid off overtly or even in subtext.
If I have missed something here I was not alone.
The audience around me looked baffled, confused and well... unsatisfied.
And had I but one word to use by way of review that would be it- "unsatisfying".
The acting is perfectly fine and in the case of Toby Jones- damned good.
It is shot, edited and directed well enough too.
But it comes off like a student film designed to showcase all of the techniques that have been learned at film school but singularly lacking in any narrative appeal.
At best it is interesting to look at, at worst- pure pretension.
I had lost interest long before the mercifully abrupt ending.
An hour earlier I had started to long for a glimpse of the movie being made in the film so that it may entertain me in lieu of the one I was there to watch.
When I left after the screening I wanted to watch "Suspiria" or "Blow Out" or "Peeping Tom" or even Christopher Nolan's terrific debut "Following" again.
And this was because I was leaving the cinema unsatisfied - I was like a man leaving his frigid girlfriend's house cruising past the local brothel with a longing eye.
When the most exciting scene is one in which Gilderoy angrily demands that his expenses be paid your film has a problem.
This is a perfect example of a movie obsessed with being a 'film' as if that in itself guarantees success.
For me movies should tell stories or invoke emotion.
They should dazzle us with wonderment or tell us something that we didn't know. Some make us laugh and provide relief from the often harsh reality of the world beyond the dark auditorium.
They can cleverly get under our skin and into our heads and make us think about things in a different way.
The best ones do several (or even all) of these things.
"Berberian Sound Studio" is one of the few films that I have seen recently that manages to do none.
A massive disappointment.
I knew nothing beyond the lead actor Toby Jones and that it was about a sound engineer working on an Italian horror movie in the seventies.
I wasn't even aware of what genre the film itself was - only the one within the film.
Hard to get a feel for its worth then.
In fact I saw the poster advertising it online, decided that I wasn't interested for some reason and promptly filed it in the part of my head that stores odd titles of upcoming movies.
It snuggled in there for a few days with "Camille Rewinds" and "Someday This Pain Will Be Useful To You" and I assumed that that would be the end of it.
Then I got an e-mail saying that I had two tickets waiting for me at The Academy cinema to see this movie.
So, having learned previously with the likes of "Your Sister's Sister" and "Headhunters" that the movies that don't really appeal beforehand are often the ones that become favourites I thought I'd give it shot.
Besides- this would be the only big screen showing and there was a free collector poster included.
The film begins with Gilderoy (Toby Jones) arriving at a film studio in Italy to take up a position producing the sound for a horror movie.
We won't learn his first name or much else about him apart from that he has a mother back home with whom he lives.
She writes to him of 'chiff chaffs' that are nesting in the garden and wishes that he was back home.
 |
| Toby Jones as Gilderoy |
He records ADR using a couple of actresses and foley with a bunch of fruit and vegetables, carving knives and mallets.
He has a host of sound boards, reel to reel tape and audio machinery to mix, distort and record sound effects.
The camera lingers over the sound equipment in an almost lecherous manner, swooping across boards covered in sliders and along sprockets as film and tape pass through.
If there exists a perversion in which people find fulfillment in vintage electronic equipment then this film is these peoples "Deep Throat".
One of the aspects of "Berberian Sound Studio" that I found interesting is that the film Gilderoy is working on is never shown.
We hear the dialogue and there are many descriptions of what is happening on screen but we only ever see the production - not the film itself.
It's a fascinating twist to show only the production and completely reverses the intentions that most movies have.
Everything is behind the scenes with this one.
Clever it may be but it does add some frustrations.
The film being made seems part Mario Bava, part Dario Argento.
In fact it could be "Suspiria" that Gilderoy is working on.
There is much talk of witches and rituals and there are scenes of extreme violence.
One calls for Gilderoy to make the sound of a red hot poker being insterted into a witches' vagina.
 |
| Italian Film Producers... smarmy since 1895 |
Certainly it troubles our hero who starts to become mentally unstable as things progress.
I use the word progress loosely because not a lot happens in this film.
It has much of the feel of Antonioni's "Blow Up".
Sure- the period and the backdrop are similar but unlike the great 1966 film it doesn't intrigue nearly as much.
Movies like David Lynch's terminally weird "Mulholland Drive" get away with not ultimately revealing or resolving much by being fascinating and hypnotic.
That film drives us forward on the promise of a mystery solved and even if it fails to do that for most viewers (I include myself) the trip is nonetheless entertaining enough on its own.
In the case of "Berberian Sound Studio" whatever build up there is is never paid off overtly or even in subtext.
If I have missed something here I was not alone.
The audience around me looked baffled, confused and well... unsatisfied.
And had I but one word to use by way of review that would be it- "unsatisfying".
The acting is perfectly fine and in the case of Toby Jones- damned good.
It is shot, edited and directed well enough too.
But it comes off like a student film designed to showcase all of the techniques that have been learned at film school but singularly lacking in any narrative appeal.
At best it is interesting to look at, at worst- pure pretension.
I had lost interest long before the mercifully abrupt ending.
An hour earlier I had started to long for a glimpse of the movie being made in the film so that it may entertain me in lieu of the one I was there to watch.
When I left after the screening I wanted to watch "Suspiria" or "Blow Out" or "Peeping Tom" or even Christopher Nolan's terrific debut "Following" again.
And this was because I was leaving the cinema unsatisfied - I was like a man leaving his frigid girlfriend's house cruising past the local brothel with a longing eye.
When the most exciting scene is one in which Gilderoy angrily demands that his expenses be paid your film has a problem.
 |
| Here's a nice picture of the pretty but sullen Berberian Sound Studio receptionist - some enjoyment at least |
For me movies should tell stories or invoke emotion.
They should dazzle us with wonderment or tell us something that we didn't know. Some make us laugh and provide relief from the often harsh reality of the world beyond the dark auditorium.
They can cleverly get under our skin and into our heads and make us think about things in a different way.
The best ones do several (or even all) of these things.
"Berberian Sound Studio" is one of the few films that I have seen recently that manages to do none.
A massive disappointment.
| Rated | M for descriptions of R rated content |
| Running Time: | 92 minutes (1hr 28mins without end credits) |
| Starring: |
| Toby Jones | --- Gilderoy |
| Tonia Sotiropoulou | --- Elena |
| Suzy Kendall | --- Gilderoy's Mother |
| Cosimo Fusco | --- Francesco |
| Susanna Cappellaro | --- Veronica |
| Lay;a Amir | --- Equestrian Girl |
| Hilda Peter | --- Auditionee |
| Chiara D'Anna | --- Elisa |
| Eugenia Caruso | --- Claudia |
| Lara Parmiani | --- Chiara |
| Antonio Mancino | --- Santini |
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