On the Edge of the Abyss (1982)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | On the edge of the abyss |
| Original title | Five Days One Summer |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1982 |
| length | 108 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Fred Zinnemann |
| script |
Michael Austin based on Kay Boyle's story “ Maiden, Maiden ” |
| production | Fred Zinnemann |
| music | Elmer Bernstein |
| camera | Giuseppe Rotunno |
| cut | Stuart Baird |
| occupation | |
| |
On the Edge of the Abyss is an American feature film made in the Alps from 1982 with Sean Connery in the lead role . Director Fred Zinnemann gave his staging farewell performance here.
action
The plot of the story set in the Swiss Alps in 1932 is largely limited to three people. The Scottish doctor Douglas Meredith has come with Kate, a much younger woman at his side. He introduces her as his wife, but in reality she is his niece, 25 years younger than him and his secret lover. The unequal couple, surrounded by a touch of tragedy and melancholy, are planning a climbing tour in the mountains. Flashbacks reveal the true relationship between the two. Kate has been magically drawn to Douglas since childhood. When she was still a child, he went to India as a military doctor and did not return until ten years later, married. Kate, now a young woman, flies into his arms, and the two quickly develop a secret love affair.
Here in the mountains, the two of them don't just want to relax, they also want to clarify their relationship with one another. The smoldering conflict between Douglas and Kate threatens to break out in the wasteland of the high mountains. It comes to a fateful encounter with the mountain guide Johann, who corresponds more closely to Kate's generation, which she likes and who soon casts an eye on her. Kate tells him that Douglas is married but not to her. When Kate Douglas reveals that she will not leave with him, but wants to stay in the village for longer, he reacts with incomprehension.
On a mountain tour together, they accidentally discover the body of a man in a crevasse. As Johann correctly suspects, it is the body of his uncle who, forty years ago, on the eve of his wedding, set out on a mountain tour from which he has never returned. His bride, now an old woman dressed in black like a widow, had never married.
Johann watches the couple, but understands neither Kate nor Douglas' behavior. He openly tells Kate that Douglas and Kate's relationship has no future and that he believes the couple's behavior is wrong. The two men watch each other, their rivalry comes to a head. On a climbing tour in which only Johann and Douglas participate, Johann addresses the subject of Kate, to which Douglas reacts with anger and jealousy. During the dangerous descent, Johann got stuck in the wall, triggered a rockfall and fell into the depths, while Douglas survived.
During the absence of both men, Kate has decided to cut ties with Douglas for good. After Johann's funeral, Kate leaves, and Douglas remains alone in the mountain village.
Production notes
At the edge of the abyss , a large part of it emerged in the Swiss Alps (Cima di Castello, Val Forno glacier, Piz Badile in the canton of Graubünden ). The locations were Latsch GR , Pontresina and Samedan . The manufacturing cost was around $ 15 million. The film premiered on November 12, 1982 in New York and was shown for the first time in Germany on March 4, 1983.
The buildings were designed by Willy Holt , the costumes by Emma Porteous . Arthur Wooster got several mountain shots. Sean Connery is dubbed by Gert Günther Hoffmann .
Reviews
The Anglo-American criticism hardly left a good hair on this very poor-story film. With Rotten Tomatoes , there were only a few votes that were consistently negative, while the European intellectual critics at least paid the old master their respect for his last film director. On the occasion of his 85th birthday, Zinnemann stated in an interview in 1992: “I'm not saying that this was a good film. But there was a certain degree of malice in the reviews. The pleasure some people got from putting the film down really hurts ” .
“A mountain film with excellent photography and craftsmanship, related to the German epics of the early 30s. Unfortunately the content is very thin. "
“The adaptation of Kay Boyle's story is not really going off, despite an impeccable production. Slowly, ethereally, ultimately unsatisfactory. "
“As in almost all Zinnemann films, this melancholy melodrama is about moral decisions and conflicts of conscience. (...) In the most beautiful sequence of ' On the Edge of the Abyss ', the villagers find the body of a man who disappeared forty years ago in a crevasse. An ancient woman in black is brought in. Mute, motionless, she stands in front of the corpse of her bridegroom, which the ice has preserved in its boyish masculinity. The film has a very similar effect: as if thawed from an earlier, more innocent time in cinema, photographed by Fellini's cameraman Giuseppe Rotunno with very bright, clear light. Zinnemann hates explicit sex scenes, at the moment of the highest passion you can see a pearl necklace breaking. ' On the Edge of the Abyss ' is a strangely touching find from the 'musée sentimental' of the cinema, quite 'out of date' and therefore a welcome oasis in the desert of mechanical monsters. Sean Connery, one of the few great film actors still around, achieves his best performance under Zinnemann's direction: torn between his obsession and his sense of dignity, rebellious against old age, half resigned, very tender and very alone. The important films of 1983 look different than this cautious journey of the old mountaineer Fred Zinnemann into the landscape of his youth. But what does that matter? In Zinnemann's film there is an old-fashioned magic that lasts longer than some current fashion sensations. You can see it well. "
“Using a conventional triangular story and the means of the dramatic home film, the model case of a crisis of conscience is developed. A largely successful attempt to translate abstract problems and internal processes into impressive images of nature and a gripping external plot. In addition, a personal experiment on age and impermanence. "
Individual evidence
- ↑ Five Days One Summer, reviews , Rotten Tomatoes, accessed September 2, 2019
- ↑ A Lion in His Winter . Report from the Los Angeles Times
- ↑ On the Edge of the Abyss in the Lexicon of International Films
Web links
- On the edge of the abyss in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- extensive review in the New York Times
- Five Days One Summer Variety, December 31, 1981