DOSTOEVSKY IN CINEMA

  DOSTOEVSKY IN CINEMA

  By Alain Leroy II

If you’re one who likes to read the book before watching the movie, well – you’re in luck when it comes to reading Fyodor Dostoevsky. Why? Because the addictive, ascetic, gambling, prophetic, spiritual lecher, Mr. Dostoevsky, himself inspired so many tremendous directors to adapt his work. In doing so, directors often follow his text sincerely and faithfully, such as Russian director Ivan Pyryev’s dependable versions of The Idiot (1959) and The Brothers Karamazov (1968). However, more notorious are the adaptations that steer away from the original writing and take on an innovative dimension, for example, Akira Kurosawa’s The Idiot (1951), Andrzej Żuławski’s The Public Woman (1984), Jean-Luc Godard’s La Chinoise (1965), Robert Bresson’s Au Hasard Balthazar (1966), and Woody Allen’s Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989).

After laboring through nearly all of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s canonical works of literature, a cinema fan will be greatly rewarded with movie adaptations, as a plethora of exceptional directors found his mid-to-late 19^th century novels so moving they created films, ‘inspired by’ the Russian progenitor of the domestic drama.

Dostoevsky was a gambling man. To the point of risking all his possessions on a hand and in failing to win, was forced to live in destitution. Were he alive to see how the advent of cinema manipulated his written work, he would certainly enjoy the more nebulous, rebellious and oddly modernized adaptations. Although there are at least 15 honorable mentions to Dostoevsky in film, I will choose three movies to elaborate on here.

L’Amour Braque (1985) Directed by Andrzej Żuławski 

 

 In an excellent article on the film, our friends from ACIDemic Journal and Media write:

“…This stuff is so fucked-up in its mad play on words-on-action genre and bourgeoisie art film expectation subversions that it can be hard to know where to set your bearings... I mean, unless you are first "experienced" or have spent time in a lunatic theater company, or seen a lot of Bergman movies about lunatic theater companies, or are on meds, a lot of meds.”

Appropriate, being that Dostoevsky spent much of his childhood living next to a psychiatric ward, a stereotypical brutal Russian insane asylum during the early 19^th century. He must have encountered a circus of mental maladies. In his books, he turned those maladies into melodies and the same could be said for Zulawski’s films. A fitting summation for personal reasons as well. Around the time I started a “lunatic theatre company” and created a “Video Dance Poetry Society,” I had been extremely inspired by a viewing of L’Amour Braque in 35 mm print. The titillating visual experience of watching Zulawski's movies in this format changed my perception of not only him as a director but the medium in general. There is something mind-altering about Zulawski in print.

Although now, years after my theatre company deteriorated to mere Youtube crumbs, I don't truly relate to this histrionic movie but despite being reduced to re-watching it on the banal  DVD quality, I still consider it a cinematic spectacle. Also, to quickly respond to ACIDemic, yes I have seen over 30 Ingmar Bergman films but I am not on medication of any kind.

Who knows how many Bergman films Zulawaski watched in his lifetime and if he even related to the master Swede. Yet, we do know that Zulawski began his career under the tutelage of an older Polish director, Andrzej Wajda and in 1988, Wadja adapted his own Dostoevsky, The Possessed. 

Zulawski certainly one-upped his teacher with this film. In his adaptation of The Idiot, AKA, L’Amour Braque, he sets the stage for by far the best bizarre love triangle of any of the six or so filmic adaptations of this work. Also, this audacious adaptation is very much Zulawski’s own, a furiously energetic 1980’s French crime-heist in which the essences of Prince Myshkin, Rogozhin and Nastasya Filippovna are present but not ruined by any staunch obligation to the codex.

Idioot (2011) Directed by Rainer Sarnet

 

Prince Myskhin is an introverted contrarian who suffers from an enigmatic sickness that takes form in an anxiety that leads to an epilepsy, this, a century before Joy Division recorded a song. Myshkin’s astute observations of others, his undisguised, unabashed and mellow approach to conversation proves to be, in the world of high-society, unintentional strife and therefore, confusion. It is possible that were he living today, his peers and superiors would simply state, ‘oh, you know that Myshkin, he’s on the spectrum.’

   

Regardless of his aloof, autistic characteristics, almost every character he meets develops a sense of trust and a strong bond with the Count. Be it adoration, admiration, love or simply friendship, people trust the Prince implicitly. Most of the time they don’t know why they find him so trustworthy. By allowing him into their circle, those around him only add fuel to their chronic conflicts with his mysterious influence.

So, what is the essence of Prince Myshkin (and many a Dostoevsky protagonist)?

The novel, more so than most adaptations, alludes to Myshkin being a messiah who returns to a high-society only to be mentally crucified and socially outcast. Perhaps he has corrupted the youth by convincing children to choose joy and love instead of hate and vindictive behavior. Maybe he is considered to be too upfront, honest, and real when he should instead say nothing and do, not feel, as he's told. And what of his supposed downfall: falling in love with the quintessential femme fatale in Nastasya Filippovna? Regardless, being that the novel is nearly 700 pages and his love interest hardly makes mention in 200 of them, the real essence and legacy of Prince Lyov Myshkin is his negligence toward standard social behavior.

 
(Above) Prince Myshkin played by Estonian actor, Risto Kübar in 2011. 

(Below)  Prince Myshkin, played by Russian actor, Yuri Yakovlev in 1951.

 Because of his inability to acknowledge norms and instead answer to everything in accordance with faith, poetry and humbling sentiment, he is simultaneously adored and ashamed.

Are you a painter with no subject to paint? Dostoevsky’s epileptic Christ imitator, Myshkin, lacks a messiah complex but is replete with a severe anxiety toward beauty and will tell you to paint the face of a criminal right before they are executed. Why? He believes the subject to be sacred and profane; in one sense the criminal is tortured knowing their life is so close to its conclusion, on the other, the criminal is surely to reflect over their entire existence leading up to their head being cut off, and therefore all that occurred prior to that moment had and will define that person, leaving them with a sense of renewal and gratitude for life.

Fyodor Dostoevsky had a first-person experience of something quite similar as within five minutes of his ostensible execution they pulled the plug and sent him to a Siberian prison camp instead. As a fringe member of an anarchist group, he was condemned as an antagonist to the government was just short of being subjected to the firing line. He would narrowly avoid disaster throughout his fragile life.

It's difficult to consider Dostoevsky’s most elusive and reputable protagonist, Prince Myshkin, would have committed any crime worthy of a Siberian prison camp, yet he is the center of a conflict in any adaptation of this book. Although not entirely honest to the novel, Idiot is perhaps one of the most cinematic, stunning and contemporary all the filmic adaptations (and yes, I have seen them all).

The Double (2013) Directed by Richard Ayoade  

Dostoevsky, who loved Nikolai Gogol’s 1842 novel, Dead Souls, was probably more inspired by Gogol’s social commentary of the dehumanization found in bureaucracy than he was even aware of the works of Franz Kafka, but Dostoevsky’s novel, “The Double”, could be called "Kafka-esque." This adaptation is a hyper-energized, cleverly stylized dark comedy on the mechanization of humankind. The work confronts another type of anxiety-disorder, a severe schizophrenia, that although written over a century ago, could be considered a precursor to Fight Club and other stories of desensitization and self-detachment.

The contemporary British comic genius, actor, and rising filmmaker, Richard Ayoade, known for Submarine (2010), was probably inspired more by Terry Gilliam’s illustrious history of post-industrial science-fiction films than the 19th century Russian author I continuously hark upon, but he made a great rendition regardless.

 

Your initial reaction to this film may be, ‘sounds intriguing but I loathe Jesse Eisenberg.’ Not to say I am terribly fond of him myself, but after watching the film it doesn't take much effort to take ones hands off the lever of aggression and feel compassion for his sensational performance in this independent movie made early in his career that grossed less then $2 million at the box office. Ayoade’s The Double also stars soon-to-be-star, the Australian wonder, Mia Wasikowska, who looks more Eastern European than some actresses that are actually from there. This is an ensemble piece and worthwhile viewing for anyone who has worked as a cipher in a profit merger or had a self-defeating lack of self-confidence that left them in the lurch, staring up at the Eastern block skies, pondering suicide and poetic demise.

 

  For further reference enjoy this comprehensive list of Dostoevsky adaptations (not compiled by me).