Odelecol
Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.
Kaelan Mccaffrey
Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.
j-m-w
I read Effi Briest, I know the story. But i couldn't see the story in this movie. Characters just appear for one or two scenes without any introduction so you just don't know who is who in this movie.Characters who play a huge role in the book and have a rich background just appear for one or two scenes.The scenes don't deliver the actual plot at all. Suddenly its 30 years later and no mention at all, i just know, because i read the book. And this is what this film feels like: an movie you watch while reading the book. As a standalone movie its just not working at all because it doesn't deliver story. Its just random scenes from the book. Maybe the scenes which carry the essence of the book, but only as an addition to reading the book.Then there are very weird things happening in this movie, which doesn't make sense at all. e.g. the narrator starts narrating while the characters are still talking scenes of characters just standing for minutes without dialog weird text inserts which often repeat what characters just said or random things, unrelatedAnd the characters have no movements in their faces the whole movie. They just carry the same look all the time. except of Effi, who smiles from time to time but that's all. No one ever is mad, happy, angry, fearful, greedy, sad or even in love. And the book is about emotions. Its very confusing to see absolutely no emotions in this movie.
gavin6942
In the nineteenth century, seventeen year old Effi Briest is married to the older Baron von Instetten and moves into a house, that she believes has a ghost, in a small isolated Baltic town.Similarities between "Effi Briest" and 20th-century Germany were easily found, helping to explain the popularity of the book and its subsequent film adaptions there. During the 1970s, West Germany was being racked by civil unrest as people sought to effect change, among these movements was the women's civil rights movement, which became a major influence for the film, as it compared the repressive nature in society between 19th century Prussia and 1970s West Germany.Fassbinder is one of the giants of new German cinema (by "new" I mean post-WWII), and here he demonstrates his prowess. Epic in length, using black and white to its fullest extent... this is one of those films that made him great, even if it may not be the most-remembered of Fassbinder films.
ans-2
a highly philosophical, political, deep, beautiful masterpiece of Fontane, reiterated by Fassbinder. I believe that Fassbinder chose this book because it's reflects his own story of "Angst", in his case, the guilt that if we know the mistakes of our society but still hesitate to rebel.this movie, as most Fassbinder titles is no superficial hollywood entertainment, it made me think.
Sorsimus
When reviewing an ordinary film (like Jurassic Park) It is customary to note if the film is not particularly "cinematic". This would then mean that the film in question wouldn't have flashy tracking shots, groovy camera angles, fast paced editing and so on. If these are considered to be good qualities in a film then Effi Briest surely is a bad film.But what if from the beginning the film was meant to be like this? Fassbinder has chosen to hide his work in order to bring forth the original book Effi Briest is based on. To do an adaptation of a text he obviously liked a lot can't have been an easy task to a filmmaker who never relied on existing models of filmmaking. Considering that, one must view Effi Briest as an attempt to create a film as faithful as possible to the original.The result, however, is not alltogether satisfying because most of us will interpret it through a framework of "watching a film". And it must be noted that as a film Effi Briest is slowgoing, static (as is to be expected) and dramatically flat. This could be perhaps a result of a Brechtian device of Fassbinder's to prevent the audience from sinking into the plot (which in itself would be a fine starting point for a soap)but what difference does it make if the film is unwatchable.
