Goldblum Gives Tremendous Performance In Mixed Holocaust Film
Paul Schrader directed Adam Resurrected, a tale about a Jewish vaudeville entertainer during the Weimar period who later suffered dehumanization at the hands of a concentration camp commandant and survived. Noah Stollman adapted the screenplay from Yoram Kaniuk's novel of 40 years before, Schrader fashions another story with his infamous thematic elements of man vs. himself and man vs. man while simultaneously wavering between reality and psychological breakdown.Jeff Goldblum is Adam, a Jewish entertainer who is recognized by Commandant Klein (Willem DaFoe), at a concentration, as a talented comedian/musician, etc. from the 1930's. DaFoe dehumanizes Goldblum by making him mimic the actions of a dog, and years later, Goldblum flashes back to these events as he struggles to maintain his sanity and corral survivor's guilt. Derek Jacobi plays Dr. Nathan Gross at the sanitarium for survivor's where Adam (Goldblum) ends up. Once at the sanitarium in the 1960's, Adam (Goldblum) meets a boy who is locked up and acts like a dog. The irony is the boy will become Adam's salvation and resurrect his humanity lost long ago.
The subject matter is sure to repel many people and because it is a highly artsy type of film that requires viewers to play intellectual/literary gymnastics with the continuously changing tone of the film and recognizing irony, metaphors, and symbols. Black comedy, the Holocaust, Jewish guilt, mental illness, and sexual perversion are all woven tightly together and they alternate freely in sharing the focus of any particular scene. The novel was similar in that narrators appeared who were different from previous narrators in the without readers recognizing them as such. There is also not a whole lot of action and set changes. Schrader explained the difficulty understanding the film. Confounded viewers expected simple explanations for things instead of discovering something for themselves. However, this idea of using humor to survive is not new and has been filmed many times before, often to much better effect. Life Is Beautiful comes to mind.
Budget restraints are evident throughout the film with the black and white concentration camp flashbacks masking the modernity of the setting. Another area in which the low budget is evident is in the Euro-Israeli cast, although it does add an aura of authenticity. Besides the stars Goldblum, DaFoe and Jacobi, the rest of the cast is foreign including the brilliant Ayelet Zurer as Adam's (Goldblum) female interest Gina Grey. As in many lower budget films, the strengths are usually the dialog and acting. In the case of Adam Resurrected, it's mainly the acting of Goldblum and the terrific young boy playing his canine counterpart in the sanitarium: Tudor Rapiteanu. **1/2 of 4 stars.
score 6/10
CitizenCaine 30 May 2010
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2257337/35741
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