'Well a 1 isn't that a bit harsh?!' you may think. Well no. This film is freaking terrible.
The film starts out with three encounters with death, in very cold and un-emotional settings. Not very original but not too bad either, at this point the film just is what is.
After that we see a few slightly strange sketches, non of them really related to each other... A woman harassing her dance partner, two sales men with no luck trying to sell their post-war looking masks and vampire teeth and a man who is late for his appointment. The film has now gotten a bit boring, but you stay in your seats, cause it must get better, right?
Well maybe, for a little bit, the next scene that comes on hits the feeling of what this film claims to be ( a dark comedy ) for the first, and with that last, time.
We're now in a diner, just as empty and cold looking as the rest of the film, a couple is kissing and some people are drinking their drinks. But all of a sudden two soldiers in 1700 army costumes walk in, they open the doors of the diner and a man on a horse comes galloping in. What comes next is a very surrealistic scene in which the man yells: 'No women in the establishment!' and the soldiers start to hit and kick the women out, they scream and run away. Then the king comes in and randomly starts flirting with the bar tender.
This scene wasn't too bad, it actually made me laugh quite a bit and it hit the dark humor and surrealism just right.
But Andersson just couldn't leave it at that, oh no. He will and shall make something so stupid and offensive that people will walk out of the theater. Cause that's what we want to see right? An empty, repulsive film, covered in prestige and egocentric-ness.
What I'm talking about are a few of the last scenes in the film. He already starts crossing the line with the harassment scene, but after that we get a scene in which a lab monkey is being electrocuted while a woman is just relaxing and talking on the phone. Yeah okay Andersson, I get it: people are evil. Do you also have something new and interesting to show me? Apparently not. Cause what follows is a scene in which black slaves are violently forced in to a copper round device by British soldiers. The soldiers then light the fire underneath the device and it starts to spin cause the slaves are trying to run away from the heath, then the machine starts to produce music. We happily have to watch this wonderful scenery for more than five minutes ( at this point people started to walk out of the theater ). And I would've too if I hadn't felt so disconnected with the film at this point that I could only stare at it in pure disbelief. Then the camera turns away from the device and shows a few rich people drinking champagne and look at the human driven music device in amazement. And on top of that Andersson called this segment: 'Homosapiens', which tells us nothing except how full of himself this Swedish director is.
Conclusion: A film that could have been a nice play, but only cause there wouldn't have been any possibility for that horrendous slave-scene to happen. The film doesn't know what it wants to be and doesn't succeed in any direction it goes in. And that wouldn't have to be so bad, I mean, if it was just only the boring dialogue, weird scenery and cold setting, I would've given it a 5,5 for effort or something. But Roy Andersson had the balls to put in a scene that is just there for the shock effect, the 'look at how artistic I am' spirit in a movie that doesn't even come close to having the right of doing that ( and I doubt if there's a movie that would have that right ). His message is unclear, if there even is one. This is a film that is purely made for the eyes of film critics that give everything they don't understand the label of a masterpiece. But A Pigeon is the opposite of a masterpiece. It's your average tasteless Adam Sandler comedy, although Adam Sandler wouldn't even cross the lines that Andersson crossed, well hidden under a blanket of wannabe literary nonsense. A film that only get's loved by those who are too ignorant to create an own opinion and just simply love it cause a few sixty year old white men told them too.
This movie is the film equivalent of hanging an Ikea painting in an art gallery and tell people it's an expensive masterpiece.
I would take the money you were planning on spending on this film and buy a ticket for the next Divergent film or something, it's probably better than this, and will absolutely make you less angry.
The film starts out with three encounters with death, in very cold and un-emotional settings. Not very original but not too bad either, at this point the film just is what is.
After that we see a few slightly strange sketches, non of them really related to each other... A woman harassing her dance partner, two sales men with no luck trying to sell their post-war looking masks and vampire teeth and a man who is late for his appointment. The film has now gotten a bit boring, but you stay in your seats, cause it must get better, right?
Well maybe, for a little bit, the next scene that comes on hits the feeling of what this film claims to be ( a dark comedy ) for the first, and with that last, time.
We're now in a diner, just as empty and cold looking as the rest of the film, a couple is kissing and some people are drinking their drinks. But all of a sudden two soldiers in 1700 army costumes walk in, they open the doors of the diner and a man on a horse comes galloping in. What comes next is a very surrealistic scene in which the man yells: 'No women in the establishment!' and the soldiers start to hit and kick the women out, they scream and run away. Then the king comes in and randomly starts flirting with the bar tender.
This scene wasn't too bad, it actually made me laugh quite a bit and it hit the dark humor and surrealism just right.
But Andersson just couldn't leave it at that, oh no. He will and shall make something so stupid and offensive that people will walk out of the theater. Cause that's what we want to see right? An empty, repulsive film, covered in prestige and egocentric-ness.
What I'm talking about are a few of the last scenes in the film. He already starts crossing the line with the harassment scene, but after that we get a scene in which a lab monkey is being electrocuted while a woman is just relaxing and talking on the phone. Yeah okay Andersson, I get it: people are evil. Do you also have something new and interesting to show me? Apparently not. Cause what follows is a scene in which black slaves are violently forced in to a copper round device by British soldiers. The soldiers then light the fire underneath the device and it starts to spin cause the slaves are trying to run away from the heath, then the machine starts to produce music. We happily have to watch this wonderful scenery for more than five minutes ( at this point people started to walk out of the theater ). And I would've too if I hadn't felt so disconnected with the film at this point that I could only stare at it in pure disbelief. Then the camera turns away from the device and shows a few rich people drinking champagne and look at the human driven music device in amazement. And on top of that Andersson called this segment: 'Homosapiens', which tells us nothing except how full of himself this Swedish director is.
Conclusion: A film that could have been a nice play, but only cause there wouldn't have been any possibility for that horrendous slave-scene to happen. The film doesn't know what it wants to be and doesn't succeed in any direction it goes in. And that wouldn't have to be so bad, I mean, if it was just only the boring dialogue, weird scenery and cold setting, I would've given it a 5,5 for effort or something. But Roy Andersson had the balls to put in a scene that is just there for the shock effect, the 'look at how artistic I am' spirit in a movie that doesn't even come close to having the right of doing that ( and I doubt if there's a movie that would have that right ). His message is unclear, if there even is one. This is a film that is purely made for the eyes of film critics that give everything they don't understand the label of a masterpiece. But A Pigeon is the opposite of a masterpiece. It's your average tasteless Adam Sandler comedy, although Adam Sandler wouldn't even cross the lines that Andersson crossed, well hidden under a blanket of wannabe literary nonsense. A film that only get's loved by those who are too ignorant to create an own opinion and just simply love it cause a few sixty year old white men told them too.
This movie is the film equivalent of hanging an Ikea painting in an art gallery and tell people it's an expensive masterpiece.
I would take the money you were planning on spending on this film and buy a ticket for the next Divergent film or something, it's probably better than this, and will absolutely make you less angry.