Werckmeister Harmonies

I've heard about Bela Tarr, and I was well aware of his notorious affinity with long takes on his many films, and the density as well as the ambiguity that they seem to show on many occasions. But after watching, "Harmonies", one thing is unambiguously clear: he is a master of creating lingering scenes with profound mood and emotion. From the opening scene of a single shot of captivating and mesmerizing art, one is held towards the very end in anticipation of such breath-taking scenes where we lose knowledge about the fact that there are only 39 takes in this 145 minute film; where the average film length goes for staggering 3.7 minutes; where there are actors continuing on acting when any apparent purpose is lost and we merely observe what transpires naturally; we are treated to a bleak and foreboding town where things are going awry and the film is made by the camera, which is another entity of its own, creating sequences where the very emotion is filled within the elongated scene until it subsides.

The title is derived from the works of 17th century composer Andreas Werckmeister, who is responsible to a great extent for the creation of standard 12 tonal system that resides within the classical music system, or he is responsible for making it a standard practice. This is the subject matter of a polemical recording by one of the characters of the film. But we see most of the events inside the film occur through the eyes of the protagonist, Janos, who is a beloved personality in the town, possessing a greater intelligence and perspective than most of the volatile townsfolk but he is naïve and docile, often to a point where he is used as a tool for other people's intention.

After the mesmerizing opening sequence, things are set in motion with the arrival of a circus carnival and unsubstantiated rumours begin to wildly spread throughout the town about an unnatural curse of the whale and the mystique surrounding the enigmatic "Prince". The hero is seemingly unnerved by these rumours, instead he is extremely delighted by the whale, which he discovers is dead and is stinking away inside the humongous trailer. I wouldn't want to further devolve the plot of the film, as there is little, but what is great is the mood created with every shot and sequence framed in the film, and more impressively how a shot lingers on without any purpose until at the end of it there occurs a complete shift in mood.

The themes explored in the film can run into a lot of different streams, it is cumbersome to characterize them into solid ideas as the film is more focused on making us feel than try and explain what's going on. Mass hysteria and propaganda could be the leading contenders as well as panic and the tendency of humans to start rushing into conclusions; it could also be argued that the film delves into the realm of cosmic relevance of anything that exists, as anything event in the human cycle is a mere speck and we are fated to be just exist as the planets and the stars apathetically revolves through the universe without care.

But what is most conspicuous inside the veil of ambiguity, elongated scenes, monochromatic bleakness, is the film's eye and its vision. Very rarely have been there more mesmerizing sequences filled within a 2 and half hour feature. The camera glides and hovers; it descends and ascends; it zooms in and slowly reverse to reveal a greater frame or a nuanced perspective filled with a different emotion that it started with. The shots and sequences could be separately considered a master class in cinematography and atmospheric density. The most mundane things often are given importance as it is slowly revealed to be the onset of a more intense that follows it; whereas other film-makers would transition from one distinctive scene to another by cutting between the two, Tarr allows it to slowly form by not editing the transition and instead letting it run.

Perhaps, that is the most characteristic feature of this film, where you expect cuts to happen any time, but instead you realize that you are the watching the transition happen, often languorously, but organically right infront of you. You are startled by the sudden tonal shift in the scene and your wandering mind is brought back to the scene to wonder at the beautiful frame it's creating. The music that accompanies those scenes are just adding onto the stark black and white impressions being generated. This feature is said to be his most accessible, and yet with 39 shots there are times when you will look be looking around the screen and distracted because of its glacial placing. But there is a great pay off in watching the film with patience, it will create indelible impressions in your mind with its absolutely mesmerizing camera work and atmospheric allure.