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| Lear, the great hysteric, as depicted by William Dyce. |
Hello there, my dear octopoides. Today is a big day for us here at Say a Prayer for the Octopus. Today is the day we introduce a new term into the film critical lexicon: the hysterical epic. A hysterical epic possesses some or all of these four qualities: it is epic in scale and ambition, possesses a non-linear narrative structure that is closer to the avant-garde than conventional filmmaking, is full of shocking brutality, and something like half the dialogue is not merely spoken, but rather shouted in a Lear-like frenzy.
Now first, let�s use a negative example to show what the hysterical epic isn�t: Lu Chuan�s City of Life and Death, which presents a panoramic depiction of the Rape of Nanking. This movie fulfills some of the criteria of the hysterical epic: it is epic in scope and it is full of shocking brutality. But its narrative structure is linear and sensible and the dialogue, although impassioned, isn�t psychotic and unhinged (this is, more than anything, where I get the �hysterical� from).
Also, although I don�t make this an explicit requirement for inclusion in my �hysterical epic� pantheon, Lu�s film is Chinese, whereas the films that come to mind most prominently when I think of the hysterical epic are all Eastern European. They are specifically: Andrei Tarkovsky�s Andrei Rublev (1966), Franti�ek Vl�cil�s Marketa Lazarova, and Andrzej Zulawski�s On the Silver Globe (1988). Andre Rublev and Marketa Lazarova are both vast, episodic medieval nightmare tableaux. Their narratives are more impressionistic than linear. What unites them is their shocking brutality and the intense spiritual and generally human anguish that they display. Andrei Rublev follows the titular Russian icon painter as he struggles through a series of oneiric encounters (a Tatar raid, the slaughter of some pagans, the titanic effort to cast a church bell), all of it captured with hallucinogenic camera-work and Tarkovsky�s god�s-eye view. Marketa Lazarova depicts the fall of a pagan noble�s family in medieval Bohemia, as they: kidnap a young German bishop-to-be, feud with their Christian neighbors, kidnap and violate the titular Marketa Lazarova, and fight a bloody battle with soldiers of the Czech king, who�s finally had enough of their bullshit. There�s no central narrative arc, but rather a series of nightmarish things that happen all over the place. And everyone screams or grunts their dialogue.
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| On the Silver Globe; nothing weird going on here. |
But the most hysterical of hysterical epics is undoubtedly Andrzej Zulawski�s On the Silver Globe. This choppy sci-fi nightmare began production in Poland in the seventies, where the communist censors shut down production part-way through and destroyed some of the film. Years later, Zulawski, now living in France, decided to complete the film by taking the parts for which he didn�t have film and just narrating in voice-over what was supposed to have happened; this narrative plays over random Paris street scenes that have no overt connection to the story. What is the story? A group of Polish astronauts in the near future become stranded on the Moon, which turns out to be habitable and Earth-like. They send a distress probe back to post-apocalyptic Earth, but it�s only discovered years later, by which time the original astronauts have died and their inbred descendents live a primitive and religiously fanatical lunar life. Having discovered the distress probe, a brave Earth-based astronaut travels to the Moon on a rescue mission, where the inbred moonbillies promptly adopt him as their Messiah. And he�s arrived none too soon, because they need someone to lead them in their war against the horrific bat-people who keep swooping down and eating them. And I swear, well over the half the dialogue isn�t spoken, but is screamed hysterically. The astronauts scream when they become stranded, their children scream during their religious rituals, the messiah screams at everything, and everybody screams when the bat people come to feed. And all of this is cut in with scenes of 1980�s Paris and Zulawski�s calm voice-over. On the Silver Globe is the quintessential hysterical epic.
So, this is the hysterical epic, which I consider to be thus far my greatest contribution to film criticism. You are all welcome to use the term; in fact, I encourage you to popularize it. Also, if you know of other examples of the subgenre, please let me know in the comments.
