In a Glass Cage
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Movie Reviews of In a Glass Cage
Movie Review: It will shake you violently to your core....
Summary: 4 Stars
I saw this film on a "sick, twisted film" list (possibly here on Amazon), and being a bit of a film fan, I had to check it out. Many have compared this to Pasolini's Salo. The only real thing they have in common is that they are immensely disturbing films. This is one of the most intense, disturbing, and shocking (even for jaded viewers) films I have ever come across. And the fact that it was made nearly 20 years ago (in 1986, around when John Hughes was popular in American "cinema", so that shows how conservative tastes were getting back then) is even more remarkable. The film has an undeniable power to it, a strange, surreal, Iron Maiden like grip that really is hard to explain. The subject matter is grueling, and the film isn't a simplistic revenge drama either, which is probably why many have found the film so disturbing. It has a lot in common with J-horror, 10 years before the fact.
The plot is about a former Nazi who sexually abused boys when he was an officer. During a fit of remorse, he tries to kill himself by jumping from his estate, but fails, and ends up paralyzing himself. He has to be in an iron lung (aka a glass cage) in order to survive. One day, a new male nurse arrives. It's one of his victims, but the officer doesn't know it. Enough said on the plot...
Normally, a subject as intense as this wouldn't even be discussed by a Hollywood studio (especially in 1986). As one reviewer pointed out, it has some things in common with Apt Pupil, except this film is much more graphic and intense than anything Hollywood could have come up with. The film gets a little sloppy at the end (a chase scene near the end of the film is kind of derivative), but overall the film is quite powerful, unique, and intensely disturbing. If you are brave and not squeamish, watch this. It's not just for shock value, even though it may rock you to your core.
Movie Review: Ugly but necessary
Summary: 4 Stars
This film has often been compared to Pasolini's Salo. Except for some superficial elements, they don't have much in common. Granted, those superficial elements are enormous and shocking, but the resemblance stops there. The Pasolini film is faithful to Sade in spirit and philosophy if not always in detail. This movie doesn't really go there at all. So the only thing they really have in common is the fact that the situations are disgusting and repulsive, but serious in intent.
The existence of good is validated by the existence of evil. And there can be no ultimate good without ultimate evil. Recommended reading: Simone de Beauvoir: Must We Burn Sade?
Movie Review: Ready Yourself For A Emotional Rollercoaster
Summary: 4 Stars
Liking a good horror film I thought this might make for a good one. Fortunatly, reading previous reviews I was able to stomach my way through the worst scenes. I couldn't of imagined such horror (real life horror) on screen and all I wanted to yell at the screen was for someone to fight back ! You will be finding yourself scared, angry and in tears at the same time. Only a good movie can do that to you. I don't see how they could of made it any different. This movie won't be for everyone but if you think you have the stomach for it just remember its only a movie.Movie Review: Gothic nightmare
Summary: 4 Stars
An underappreciated exploration of the self-perpetuating nature of evil. In many ways a good old-fashioned gothic horror movie that many may find perverse. Yes, the imagery is nightmarish. But to my mind that's what makes the movie unforgettable. Some of the imagery is evocative of the great 20th Century artist Balthus. Only the last quarter of the film is disappointing. There's lots of prancing around the decaying villa, and the film seems to lose its focus.Movie Review: Ain't easy to watch
Summary: 3 Stars
I had no idea what was in store for me when I got "In a Glass Cage". It simply looked like another weird foreign movie about a twisted situation. It is far more than that, and I'm not necessarily saying that in a good way.
So called "perverse" films are usually not all that perverse. "Shocking" films are not usually all that shocking. "In a Glass Cage", however, is both, and in spades.
The film opens with an old man beating a naked child to death with a piece of wood in a basement. In some kind of delirious rage, he rushes to the top of the building and throws himself off the roof. It turns out this sick puppy is an ex-nazi who grew accustomed to the dubious pleasure of abusing young boys in the concentration camps he worked in. He ends up in an iron lung, and yet the local children are hardly safe; along comes Angelo, a young Japanese "male orderly" who Klaus (the ex-nazi) insists is perfect for his treatment and care, much to the irritation of his annoying, cold wife who Angelo feels is getting in the way. So he hangs her with mesh wire.
Klaus and Angelo develop a relationship which is at no point made clear enough to the viewers. The implication of the photograph that Angelo keeps (Klaus and himself as a young boy) seems to be that Angelo was one of his victims, but he seems a little too young to have been a victim of Nazi atrocities, and this 'time warp' aspect of the film is a hole big enough to drive a truck through. Maybe this is just "avant garde" type filmmaking, but all it does in this film is take away any measure of reality the relationship between the two men could have possessed.
Since seeing the film I've read grand exaplanations about it actually dealing with "the cyclical nature of abuse". I didn't see any of that. Sure, Klaus' daughter Rena is exposed to the unbelievably sick methods Angelo employs in an effort to expose Klaus to his own monstrous nature (example: replicating a scene in the old man's diary involving stabbing a needle through a child's heart and then watching him die, or brutally forcing a neighborhood youth to undress in front of Klaus and then cutting his throat), but she seems largely emotionless and incapable of comprehending what is going on. This is not about Angelos' "vengeance" on Klaus or anything else; it is an empty, heartless exercise in nihilistic style and imitation giallo. There are some redeeming qualities to the film, but they are few and far between and simply make one feel all that much more diseased. This wasn't worth the trouble of having a sychologist on the set to coach the children through the pointless, meandering scenes. This could have been a great movie, but it has no heart or substance, which given the plot makes it seem that much more sinister. I am no puritan of film but I don't think I'd watch this again of you paid me.