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Lumière and Company More at IMDbPro »Lumière et compagnie (original title)
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| Index | 14 reviews in total |
21 out of 22 people found the following review useful:
New visions through an old eye, 25 August 2000
Author:
Michael Sean from United States
This DVD is a collection of the interesting, although scattered, results of an inspired project. To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Lumiere Brothers' first motion picture, 40 directors from around the world are each allowed to shoot a short film using their original hand-cranked model. The participants have to follow three rules: 1. The film is 52 seconds. 2. No synchronous sound (most use musical scoring or dub in foley sound, and many are silent) and 3. They have to get it within three takes. Unfortunately for the viewer, several of the filmmakers opt to merely capture trite snapshots of everyday life. While this keeps in tradition with the Lumiere Brothers' original films, which wowed audiences unfamiliar with moving images a century ago, it makes for a pretty unremarkable experience today. Patrice Leconte pays tribute to their film of a train arriving in La Ciotat, France in 1895 by documenting the arrival of a modern day streamliner at the same location. Alain Corneau applies the technique of color tints to footage of a dancer twirling about. Some of them set up elaborate sequences (Gabriel Axel, Jerry Schatzberg, Peter Greenaway), some are intentionally minimal (Wim Wenders, Regis Wargnier, Andrei Konchalovsky) or simple and symbolic (Arthur Penn, Abbas Kiarostami, Francis Girod, Cedric Klapisch) and a large number turn the camera on itself (Liv Ullmann, John Boorman, Claude Lelouch, Gaston Kabore, Youseel Chahine, Helma Sanders). David Lynch is one of the few directors who rises to the challenge with an exceptionally creative effort, and his is easily the most impressive of the bunch. I'm sure it was an honor for them to be approached for the project, but the entries of Spike Lee, Nadine Trintignant, Lasse Hallstrom, and Merchant Ivory are quite unimaginative and forgettable. The menu screen lists the directors alphabetically, allowing you to jump directly to your favorite ones. Each short is designated by a chapter stop, accompanied by brief behind-the-scenes moments and interviews in which the directors awkwardly answer questions such as "Why do you film?" and "Is cinema mortal?" These unsuccessful attempts at insight are best summed up by Michael Haneke's reply: "Never ask a centipede why it walks or it'll stumble." As a tribute to film history, it's a novel and occasionally successful idea, but much of the work is too inconsistent to earn repeat viewings.
6 out of 6 people found the following review useful:
An interesting idea ...which needed a stronger editor, 4 February 2005
Author:
ian23 from east bay, CA
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
I generally agree that the results reached by these forty directors are
of wildly uneven quality.
It also appears to be a consensus that the strongest entry is David
Lynch's bizarre sci-fi collage, but I'd say closely followed by:
*) Zhang Yimou's nice reversal of the "old-fashioned" setting initially
presented... and one of the few pieces with any sense of humor...
*) Helma Sanders' beautiful four-dimensional 'painting with light'
which makes a virtue of the film stock's limited range of contrast...
*) Claude Lelouch's vertiginous kiss as camera technology evolves in
the background.
I also found some of the simpler ones quite charming, including: *)
Jaco van Dormael's portrait of a kiss by a pair of special lovers, *)
Peter Greenaway's floating numbers of time *) Wim Wenders' quiet and
simple re-visitation of his angels *) Jerry Schatzberg's snapshot of
urban scavenging and *) Bigas Luna's portrait of a nude woman nursing
in a field.
However, the vast majority of the pieces are dull, redundant (couldn't
those guiding the project have communicated with each filmmaker about
their intentions to avoid such frequent duplication?), pretentious, and
worst of all humorless.
The worst offenders are the most self-conscious pieces-- which
coincidentally tend to have the most annoying soundtracks-- including
Spike Lee (leading candidate for most self-obsessed father of the
year), Liv Ullman (hers is the least inspired of the dozen or so
camera-filming-camera pieces), and Kiju Yoshida (who pompously
announces he will demonstrate the impossibility of capturing an image
on film).
In short, 'Lumiere' is well worth a look, with some brilliant moments,
especially for students of film and film history... but keep a grain of
salt and your fast-forward button handy.
6 out of 6 people found the following review useful:
An engrossing, tumbling parade of cinematic images, 14 October 1999
Author:
allyjack from toronto
The film would be inherently fascinating even if it were no good, but there's actually a lot here of genuine interest. The repeated questions about why the directors make cinema and whether it's "mortal" receive predictably lame responses, but the glimpses of them at work, punctuated with their 50 second films, is mesmerizing. Many of them turn the project into a commentary on cinema in some form - Boorman films Neil Jordan at work, with the actors looking quizzically into the camera (a common device here, also used by Angelopoulos and Costa-Gavras); Lelouch has a sort of reverse version of the Vertigo kiss, designed with great panache. in which a historic parade of cameras observes the spiraling lovers; some, like Rivette, just take varied people and let them play (he's very engaging, seen protesting that the film is too short). Lynch's segment is magnificently skillful and striking, with a potted narrative of police, a 50's style family, and a bunch of space aliens holding a captive woman - it's almost as effective as the whole of Lost Highway and utterly distinctive. In all, it's a tumbling parade of cinematic images that evokes love, passion and breadth, whether the directors take a playful approach (a majority) or aim for greater seriousness (as in Handke's filming of a potted TV news bulletin).
7 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
Actually quite an impressive project, 19 December 2001
Author:
RoxanneAndorfer from Santa Fe, NM
This video was given to me by a friend who knows that I look at film not merely as entertainment, but art as well. This project with its 40-odd 50 second vignettes done by a mix of directors of varying talents and celebrity, using an antiquated camera, gives an opportunity to see snapshots of their work as pure art. All of them are at least passable, with over half being very, very good. A few of them are truly outstanding, the most notable being Andre Konchalovsky's gem on life, death, temporality and nature. David Lynch's segment is a close second. I highly recommend this to any serious student of film as art.
7 out of 10 people found the following review useful:
The old camera, 17 May 2006
Author:
jotix100 from New York
The idea to gather 40 recognized film directors to shoot a mini film of
less than a minute, or what would have been the format the Lumiere
brothers used in their revolutionary camera, seems a great idea in
paper. Unfortunately, what comes out is an uneven film where some of
the short films hold our interest and some others that don't go
anywhere.
What must have been an interesting idea doesn't translate to brilliant
film making in the finished product. This documentary is for fans of
the medium, but will not be of any interest to a casual viewer. Some of
the most enjoyable ones are the ones by David Lynch, Helma Sanders,
Claude Lelouch, Jaco Van Dormael, and Bigas Luna, just to mention a
few. The rest, hold some interest, but don't quite add anything new to
the idea behind the project.
4 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
A must for film students and film lovers alike..., 17 February 2001
Author:
dr.gonzo-4 from The Projection Booth
1995. The 100 year anniversary of the Lumiere Brothers first motion picture. What better way to celebrate this historical event than to gather 40 directors from around the world for a little game. The game? Each director is given access to the original Lumiere motion picture camera and about one minute of film time. Just the idea of these directors, who are used to making two hour films, throwing all their creativity into one minute is worth seeing. The rest is cinematic history. The directors are also asked to comment on why they film and if they think cinema is mortal or not. It would have helped though if they gave each director's film credits because half of them I never even heard of. This documentary gives us film in its purest art form. It's a must for film students and film lovers alike. Some of the best ones I would recommend to check out are John Boorman's, Peter Greenaway's, and of course, David Lynch's. I would have liked to see more American directors showcased like Martin Scorsese, Oliver Stone, Stanley Kubrick, or Francis Ford Coppola. But all in all, it is an engrossing, thoroughly amazing little slice of history. SEE IT!!!
5 out of 7 people found the following review useful:
Great celebration!, 16 May 2002
Author:
David (wdw-3) from New York City
I think this was a great idea. It works three fold: as a fun game, a slice of world cinema, and ultimately as a celebration of cinema. You get to see some more well known directors while some lesser known though not necessarily less important ones get exposure. I agree that David Lynch's film is probably the standout of the lot for its creativity within 50 seconds and the other rules of the game. But there are also many other interesting things going on throughout the whole exercise;weather the film is particularly entertaining or more personal, the whole project remains interesting. Other films I personally found memorable included the ones by Greenaway (also very creative, particularly his use of light), Zhang Yi Mou (sleight of hand with no special effects), Idrissa Ouedraogo and Gaston Kabore from Burkina Faso, Egypt's Youseff Chahine, to mention a few. Finally, after reading the other comments I wanted to say, instead of complaining that most of these directors showed no creativity why not think about and discuss what you yourself might film if given the chance.
7 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
An interesting diversion with a pioneering camera, 29 October 1999
Author:
Afracious from England
This film was made to celebrate one-hundred years of the first camera used by the Lumiere Brothers. Forty directors from around the world were asked to make a short film with the original camera. The rules being it lasts no longer than fifty-two seconds, only three takes allowed, and no synchronous sound. The directors are predominately French, with a few notable exceptions like David Lynch, Peter Greenaway and John Boorman. Lynch's segment is far and away the most creative and satisfactory effort. Most of the others are mainly static and ordinary. But it's a fascinating documentary with insights and comments from the all the directors, and worth seeing for Lynch's film alone. That was the prime reason I watched it.
1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Septième Art, 30 October 2010
Author:
duelek from Istanbul, Turkey
Lumière et Compagnie is a very interesting documentary, giving the audience different perspectives on the meaning of cinema within the concept of its birth a century ago. Heavily centered on directors from France and other countries with strong historical or linguistic bonds to France (Romania, Algeria, Burkina Faso etc.), the movie nevertheless tries to adopt a universal discourse on cinema through evaluating it as a global language of art. Among the movies of the 40 directors and a couple of Lumière examples shown in the film there are certain approaches and themes I find interesting and very much related to the questions asked to the participant directors about the meaning of cinema and its future. Peter Greenaway's segment with the passing calendar years starting from the symbolic date of 1895 with a constant sitting naked man was in that sense very much reminding me the novelty of cinema when compared to the life of humanity and civilization, just like the 52 seconds passing in the life of that man, who is young and promising. The parts combining the whole film together with interviews and shots showing the audience how these individual movies were made was also a theme itself in the movies of Sanders-Brahms, Chahine, Lelouch and Axel, all emphasizing on the making of the movie more than the movie itself as Lumière et Compagnie was about. The concept of realizing the presence of a camera and trying to be on the screen was elaborately used by Booman and Allouache, whereby the latter strikingly combined it with his country's patriarchal social structure. I really enjoy Costa-Gavras' segment, which delicately reminds me of my status of audience after 50 seconds of eye contact with the audience on the screen, for which cinema is produced at the end of the day. Haneke is again outstanding with filming an already prepared television shot, maybe challenging the three rules of the game in an original fashion but I prefer such rule violations when done more sincerely like in the case of Ouedraogo when he was caught by the camera saying "in Burkina Faso we can make four takes with the soldiers". Most of the directors are optimistic and even emotional when commenting on cinema and its future, but somehow many of them sound to me as clichés; maybe they are not so good in speech that's why they chose to make movies. However I think the strongest statement was uttered by Yoshida that cinema cannot capture every moment and the director shooting his movie at the real time of the nuclear bomb attack would be dead. Very reminiscent of Chacun Son Cinéma (2007) prepared for the Cannes Film Festival by 33 directors, it is always fun to watch samples from great directors and the use of the so-called first movie camera as the basic concept is a very challenging and as much as a successful idea.
1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
Revisiting the Past, 11 November 2007
Author:
Cineanalyst
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
This is a conceptually intriguing project: 40 film directors from
around the world each make a 50-some-seconds film with a restored
Lumière Cinématographe. Interspersed among the short films is footage
of them making the films as well as interviews with the filmmakers. One
thing I found surprising was how inarticulate many of them were in
responding to such essential questions as why they film, or whether
film is mortal. Overall, the added material outside of the 40 films is
interesting and adds further layers to the project.
I've been especially interested in the early history of motion pictures
and have spent much time with the Lumière brothers' films; thus, this
project becomes more rewarding for me. I suggest watching this after
seeing "The Lumière Brothers' First Films", with narration by Bertrand
Taverneir. The medium has advanced severalfold in the 100 years between
today and when the Lumière brothers contributed to the invention of
cinema. One of the great advances of the Cinématographe was its light
weight--providing mobility. First, the Lumière Company exploited this
added mobility with the subjects of their films, with the actuality
films and by taking their camera across the world. It's appropriate
that this project consists of an international array of filmmakers, as
the Lumière brothers were responsible for introducing motion pictures
and cinema to much of the world via their (or rather their assistants)
traveling the world. The next step the Lumière Company took in
exploiting this mobility was with camera movement. One of the company's
filmmakers, Alexandre Promio, was, apparently, responsible for much of
this innovation. These films consisted of panoramas or fixing the
camera to a moving object (i.e. a boat). In his Hiroshima short, Hugh
Hudson holds the camera--a "shaky cam" effect--ending with overexposing
the film by pointing the camera towards the sun, which is more movement
than the Lumière brothers had envisioned.
When limited to the technology of the Cinématographe, however, many of
the modern filmmakers' films demonstrate little to no advancement in
film grammar or insight into the medium. One of them is an updated
remake; others are like something the Lumière brothers might have
filmed. You can take that as a poor mark upon those modern directors,
or as further good marks for the Lumière's, or both. Yet, there are
exceptions in this project, such as Hudson's short. Some of the
directors do use the benefit of 100 years of hindsight to expand upon
those first films. Several of the films are clever in their
self-reference and are interesting tributes to the Lumière brothers and
film. Gabriel Axel's tracking shot of the arts and Claude Lelouch's
rotating kiss with a background progression of a history of camera
technology filming it are two of the more outstanding in this way.
Helma Sanders's "Tribute to Louis Cochet" shows the orchestration of
lighting of a stage waterfall fountain. It shows both the beauty and
limitations of the relic camera--ending with the lights turned towards
the camera. Peter Greenaway also plays with the lighting and exposure
of the film in one of the few multi-shot films in the series. As he
says, film is a great arena for him to play with image and text. The
consensus favorite, the short film by David Lynch, is also one of the
most original in the program. It also contains multiple shots (and even
the continuity transitions are creative, including flames, as though
the negative catches fire). Lynch also provided one of the more
agreeable interviews, relating that film is "a magical medium that
makes you dream". Additionally, I think the final film is appropriately
placed. It's by Theo Angelopoulos, who's in Athens and films a scene
from Homer's "Odyssey". With a title card, Ulysses ponders: "I am lost!
In which foreign country have I landed?" It clarifies and elaborates
upon a few of the other short films that had people staring into the
camera (which harks back to 100 years ago when people weren't familiar
with movie cameras). Ulysses has landed in the foreign land of cinema.
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