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A political allegory wrapped in the guise of a gory horror film,
Andrzej Zulawski s THE DEVIL did not escape the wrath of communist
censorship. The film was banned in Poland for 15 years, before
getting a sporadic release in 1987
Jakub (Leszek Teleszynski), a young 18th century nobleman, rots in
prison for conspiring against the king. A mysterious stranger frees
him, but in exchange he demands a list of Jakub's fellow
conspirators. Jakub follows the stranger on a journey across a
nightmarish, snowbound countryside where they witness countless
acts of brutal violence. Affected by the overall chaos and moral
corruption, the young nobleman descends into madness.
THE DEVIL is a lost treasure of Eastern European cinema and a
unique addition to the horror genre.
Not as goos as Possession, but worth watching.Reviewed by Robert P. Beveridge, 2010-01-16
Diabel (Andrzej Zulawski, 1972)
After being completely wowed by Possession, Zulawski's 1981 drama
about the disintegration of the world's most dysfunctional family,
I started hunting down other Zulawski works. Thus I came upon
Diabel, a 1972 historical drama that has far more in common with
Makavejev than it does with Eisenstein, an absurdist fantasia
informed by cheapo sixties gore films and contemporary Soviet
politics as much as Prussia's 1793 invasion of Poland (which would
have been interchangeable with any other; as Gunter Grass has often
said, Poland is the world's most-invaded nation. I'm guessing
Zulawski had eighteenth-century costumes and went from
there.)
The plot involves Jakub (Leszek Teleszynski, who started as a
Zulawski regular), who as the film opens is a political prisoner.
Just before the place he's being held is overrun by invading
Prussians, he's sprung from captivity by a mysterious savior, who
takes him (and a young nun who flees with them) back to his family
estate in the country, where he is reunited with his sister and
meets her decidedly odd fiance. Jakub was being kept prisoner
because the Prussians believe he has valuable information about
revolutionary conspirators (they believe, in fact, he is one);
Jakub continually protests his innocence on this front, but like
Kafka's Joseph K, you get the feeling there's more to the story
than he's telling. For roughly the first two-thirds of the film,
Jakub, in the company of his savior and his sister's beau,
witnesses the effects of the complete breakdown of civilization the
Prussian invasion has brought about. Once he's finally had enough
of that to drive him insane, he, too, embraces a reversion to his
animal nature, though as a few reviewers have noted, throughout the
film Jakub is the sanest person we meet, with the possible
exception of the hot young nun (played by Zulawski's
then-girlfriend Malgorzata Braunek). The ending of the film is
sadly predictable, though maybe I'm jaded and you won't see it
coming at all.
Zulawski, in his early thirties when this movie was completed,
definitely adopts an angry-young-man approach to his material here,
using it as an excoriation of Soviet policy (as he did many of the
films he made in Eastern Europe) as well as an exercise in pushing
the envelope. Like most of Zulawski's Polish films, this one was
banned in Poland for many years, surfacing only in the late
eighties, because of its implicit criticism of Soviet policy (the
Prussian invaders and the KGB look awfully similar) and its
seemingly gratuitous violence and perversion. It's a movie that's
designed to provoke, and in that sense, it doesn't work as well as
Makavejev's WR, which came out the year before, but then it's also
a piece with a vastly different tone to it. Makavejev was after
farce, airing his criticisms through the parallel of sexual
politics and humor. Zulawski wanted to open the system up and take
a look at the guts through eye-gouging, incest, and shooting people
in the face. Same result, but very different approaches.
Ultimately, I don't think it works as well here, though when you
contrast it to later films that adopted the same approach (most
notably T. F. Mous' Men Behind the Sun), Zulawski's movie, while
less coherent than many of its stripe, is still riveting. As with
most groundbreaking seventies films from the Polish underground,
you have to be prepared for its low-budget amateur status; those
who have only been exposed to Zulawski through Possession (the only
of his films to have an American DVD release to this day) may find
themselves surprised at how much this looks like film school work.
But then, so does WR, and no one denies that movie's classic
status. Worth seeing for fans of political films that are actually
good, as few of them as there are, and a must-see for gorehounds.
** ½
Servicable release, but don't buy it.Reviewed by M. Lucas, 2009-04-23
Anyone who has an interest in Eastern European cinema probably
knows the label Facets, the grin-and-bear-it, necessary-evil
company that distributes most major titles of Czech and Polish
classics in the US in barely tolerable (or intolerable) releases
that skirt bootleg quality. They distribute DVDs for PolArt, which
issues "unauthorized" releases of Polish films -- whatever that
means.
The two PolArt Zulawski releases, The Devil and On the Silver
Globe, are pretty much the only available releases of these films
here or in the UK. It could be worse -- these are not unwatchable,
and fans of the filmmaker will want to catch these films in
whatever form they can get them in.
But I wouldn't buy these releases. Mondo Vision has been issuing
superb editions of Zulawski films (La femme publique, and The Most
Important Thing: Love is coming soon), and apparently holds the
rights to almost all of the Zulawski catalogue, including these two
films. I would hazard a guess that its only a matter of time before
these two films get a beautiful, worthy release for about the same
price as these shoddy pseudo-bootlegs.
Just hold out a little while longer, Zulawski fans.
The Devil is like stepping into a world of insanityReviewed by Richard J. Brzostek, 2008-04-19
Andrzej Zulawski's The Devil (Diabel) is a portrait of insanity. It
is a horror movie that not everyone will appreciate. The reason for
that would mostly be due to it not being sensible. Many of the
people in the film act like they are drugged out, there is a
theatrical feeling to the way they talk and unquestionably many of
them act insane. To say the movie is surrealistic would be an
understatement. The Devil is like stepping into a world of
insanity.
The story starts out with a crafty beaded man dressed in black
entering an asylum run by nuns in 1793, when the Prussians took
over part of Poland. He frees a political prisoner, Jakub, moments
before the Prussian army goes in and murders everyone there. His
liberator becomes a sort of strange guide and tries to influence
his morals.
Jakub's guide is very animated and shows him various places as they
travel together in the countryside. His impish guide seems all
knowing. The people Jakub meets are deeply affected by the war and
appear insane. The moral decay Jakub observes influences him. At
the urging of his guide, he is transformed into a murderer.
Although The Devil may appear senseless at first, there is meaning
in it. At first, my impression was that we are seeing insanity
caused by war. But I also thought it suggests the real cause of war
and insanity is sin. Of course, just as with great literature,
there are many possible messages one could reveal from this film.
Furthermore, there are also political comments weaved throughout
the entire movie dealing with patriotism and invaders.
The Devil is unquestionably different. The fact that it is a
horror, which is relatively rare in Polish cinema, makes it stand
out compared to other Polish films. Perhaps the closest film to The
Devil (1972) is Instability (Nienasycenie; 2003), which is also
Polish. Both films have that surrealistic feeling and nearly
everyone in them is crazy; both have atypical sex and nudity
interspersed thought the story; both are for viewers that want
something very different. I have to add that even if you didn't
care for Instability that you still may enjoy the Devil because it
very unique.
