Guido Carani, an engineer of noble descent, has just lost his son born to him by a chorus dancer, who, desperate, has become a nun. After a while he also loses his wife and daughter in a car accident. Poor Guido is in despair, but soon he meets Lina, a woman who is a dead ringer for Luisa.
Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.
Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?
n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.
What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.
On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.
One thing is for sure O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.
Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.
劉別謙初嚐美高梅大製作的派頭，一切筆法更神采飛揚。開敞的場景、空前的排場讓人物裏裏外外恣意張開：寡婦的心更顯孤獨，男女的愛更加沒處安放。坐擁小國大部分財富的寡婦忽然要搬到巴黎重新尋找生活色彩，國王唯恐國祚不保來一招美男計，派出風流種子色誘寡婦。本來一個用情一個求性，幾番邂逅與折騰，改寫了男男女女的基本需要。歌與舞沒有賣弄甜膩，反而放在愛情的沉重中換來了歌頌。歌與影無間交流，劉別謙輕歌劇巔峰之作，亦成了荷里活極有代表性的一章。司花利亞與珍娜．麥當奴最後一次合作，後者散發從未有過的成熟韻味。堪稱最性感的音樂劇。
Rated "the sexiest musical in the thirties", The Merry Widow could well be the sexiest musical ever. Jeannette MacDonald, sensual and majestic as a Persian cat, is the wealthiest widow in the kingdom of Marschovia. On a visit to Paris, she attracts a flurry of gold-diggers. To prevent her fortune from passing to foreign hands, the king sends a romantic envoy to court her. He chooses Captain Donilo, whose cavalier attitude to women is not limited to his rapport with Maxim's "girls, girls, girls". Osé but not blasé, this elegant adaptation of Franz Lehar's operetta out-classed von Stroheim's silent in opulence, culminating in the grandest of grand balls.
Source: 28th HKIFF
前东德最好的一部超现实主义幻想剧！
this is one of the most amazing looking,surreal films of all time and i only recently acquired it on video.it was just as good after fond childhood memories of it.highly recommended,with great special effects,and stunning set design,and vivid colour and cinematography.buy with confidence!
This is as you remember watching it as a child. Lifelike, overtly coloured and full of magical splendor, terrifying nasties and surreal characters. In short, do not shy away from this opportunity to show a "Christmas Special" to your children in favour of the usual fare from Disney and co. Rather, pop a fresh batch of pop corn, get first dibs on the comfy chair and opt for what was arguably one of the highlights of East German children's programming.
