Bent
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Movie Reviews of Bent
Movie Review: From party animal to deep commitment
Summary: 5 Stars
This film is catching. It provides an insight from a German guy, living changes in the "gay" lifestyle at the begining of the Nazi Period. Although not being a documentary, it is a "could be" movie. At the begining of the film we are in a wild club with fancy and trendy people flirts, watch "modern" performances and enjoy and industrial envoiromen. It reproduces the mood of early 30's Berlin, were "gay life" was active in clubs like EL DORADO, bistros and even gay and lesbian magazines like Die Freundschaft. Life is a party for Max, the main character. However, Nazi politics, which includes homosexuals witch-hunt, is the end of that golden era. It is not mentioned in the film, but although that active gay life, there were a law against homosexuality (Paragraph 173). That is a reminder for us now, it is not only important to have social tolerance or acceptance, but to be sure laws are changed for not raising among the dead and haunt us in the most unexpected moment. Max meeting a self-confident guy at a concentration camp will make him understand the differences between sex and love. Although being a similar theme to A LOVE TO HIDE, the French film is more oriented on external situations of being gay in France, focusing on police activity, concentration camps abuses and even mentioning castration, hormones experiments and cerebral interventions with homosexuals. BENT is more introspective about being gay in a hostile envoiroment, as well as personal evolution from egocentrism to commitment. A touching film to see and talk about with friends.Movie Review: absolutely amazingly sublime
Summary: 5 Stars
I admit to buying this DVD because of Clive Owen, the most handsome man alive. However, after watching the film I realized that I made the right choice in terms of great cinematography as well. And no, not because it's another triumph for the GLBT crowd. This film is simply one of the best character studies available. Without delving into the plot too much - Clive Owen is great as a smart but fragile "fluff" Max who realizes only too late that some things are worth more than life. He goes through the entire film trying to avoid reality; his repeated phrase "This is not happening... this is not happening" on the train is so raw that it's hard to watch; about as hard as it is NOT to feel sorry for him when he dashes back and forth saying "I'm going to survive... I'm going to survive". By the end of the film, he realizes that survival at all costs is not worth the effort.
The film does a good thing when it leaves the most gruesome moments to viewers' imagination - like the necrophiliac act with a (probably) Jewish girl that Max is forced to perform to prove he's not queer(watch the film to find out why). Overall, the film is in very good taste, which must have been hard to do without diminishing the power of it's message; the gay "intercourse" might be too much for some, but I found it to add an important dimension to the film.
Overall, a great film with sublime lead performances - although I find the Mick Jagger hype hard to understand.
Another great film with a similar theme: "Max" with John Cusack as a leading man.
Movie Review: Not Your Average Nazi Film
Summary: 5 Stars
All these years later, what stands out most in my memory of this film is its overpowering moodiness. More than any other holocaust film, Bent leaves the veiwer feeling haunted for a long, long time.
The film acheives this not only through what it gives us - great acting and dialogue - but also what it does not. Nothing in Bent is larger than life as you and I live it. The cast is bare-bones and the "camp" is merely an abandoned industrial complex. It is absences and emptiness that weigh so heavily upon the characters and their audience.
The tension created between the utterly naturalistic performances and their dream-like surroundings is what gives such power to the film. With no real crowd scenes and no authentic reproductions of camps, there is nothing to divert our attention from Max's odyssey. It is what happens to and within this one man that overwhelms.
I have some trouble recommending this film, because it is the sort that can leave one feeling disturbed for weeks. Some people might not consider it worth it no matter how great a work of art it may be.
However, I think that visually, it is one of the most poigniant commentaries on Nazi philosophy ever rendered on film - the adroit symbolism of the soulless factory-of-death alone is worth the price of admission.
Movie Review: Don't Let "Bent" Fall Through the Cracks Again
Summary: 5 Stars
Many reviewers have made insightful comments about the new-to-DVD "Bent" in this space. I first saw the film version of what was originally a play in 1998, shortly after its release. Now it is released again and I've given it a second look. It remains as powerful, and underrated, as ever. Though you sometimes can't escape the fact that it began its life on the stage, "Bent" is a success as cinema, with superb cinematography and powerfully understated performances by the entire cast--including the splendid Mick Jagger, as Greta, who embodies the rudderless, urban, hyperstylized post WWI-era Berlin so vividly depicted in Christopher Isherwood's "Berlin Diaries 1929 - 1939. Jagger's pitch perfect,mannered performance of "Streets Of Berlin" is quite haunting, and his "mask" of a woman, intentionally transparent, gone in place of expediency when he perfoms a careless (rather than malevolent) act of duplicity that would surely be avenged brutally. R.W. Fassbinder, had he lived to direct this work, may have made it as deliberately 'theatrical' as his adaptation of Genet's "Querelle," but I doubt it: I wish he lived long enough to give us his version. But "Bent" is a film for those who love cinema and are willing to see a powerful film about love and redemption: don't believe it is a "gay" movie or a "holocaust" film - see it and be moved.Movie Review: Very amazing!!
Summary: 5 Stars
This movie is about a long long time ago that police arrested them for being gay, jewish, black and white being together, etc etc yadda yadda blah blah blah but whatever but this point was about the police picked 2 lovers up and arrest these 2 lovers for being gay but what really pissed me off was that the officer beat 1 out of 2 lovers up with the stick and threw out of the train and the other person was still in the train and happened met "someone else" but he thought the "love" word doesnt mean anything to him until in the end and realized he truly fall in love with this man in prison. He held this man in his arms and finally spoken said "I Love You" and decided to kill himself with the eletric fence. It's ALMOST the same part with QAF (Queer As Folk) when Brian the guy who played in QAF said he didnt believe in love but believes in f**king but then in the final season Brian finally realized that he was in love with Justin. I am so glad this year is not like the years years ago!!!