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Mahler [VHS]

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This is a rather bizzare movie on the life of the Austrian composer Gustav Mahler. Then again, perhaps it would be borderline impossible for anyone to conceive of a movie about Mahler which was not bizarre. The movie makes an attempt to reconstruct the psychology of an artistic genius, one who was so inspired by the works of Beethoven, Wagner, Goethe, Nietzsche & Novalis.

The film takes place aboard a train; Mahler and his wife are both travelling on board. The trainride sees Mahler indulge in a number of flashbacks and nightmares, all of which provide the vehicle for Ken Russell to divulge the more salient episodes of Mahler's life. Among these are his childhood artistic inspirations, the rocky relationships he had with his wife & family and the unfortunate but infamous encounter he had with the emperor of Austria.

As a biography of a composer, this one does not rank up there with "Amadeus," "Immortal Beloved" or Richard Burton's "Wagner." However, it does do a credible job of engaging some of the more memorable epochs of his life, as well as his incessant infatuation with death. There are also some intentional anachronisms, such as his "meeting" with Cosima Wagner.

Far more important though, is the introspective look which the movie offers on the isolated existence of a tormented genius. The continual anguish of this friendly, misanthropic megalomaniac is felt throughout. Someone once asked Mahler, "How could a man as kind-hearted as you have written a symphony so full of suffering?" "It is," replied Mahler, "the sum of all the suffering I have been compelled to endure at the hands of life." Such is the theme of this movie. Such was the theme of Mahler's life. It is a theme sometimes gruesome, sometimes hauntingly beautiful, and always gripping. See this movie, and hear the theme for yourself.

Film auteur Ken Russell made at least six biographical movies about celebrated composers, three of which enjoyed commercial release in the United States: "The Music Lovers," about Tchaikovsky; "Mahler," about its titular subject; and "Lisztomania," really about Wagner as much as it was about Liszt. Unseen in commercial release in North America (and unseen by me) are studies of Frederick Delius, Sir Arnold Bax, and Bela Bartók. Known for his extravagance - and, let us be honest, his vulgarity - Russell nevertheless believes passionately in these projects and endows his composer-artists with an especially powerful aura. (At one point, in the late 1960s, Russell apparently tried to help in the promotion of Lyrita's release of symphonies by Bax, although his plan was eventually scuttled by Lyrita's management.) The Tchaikovsky, Liszt, and Mahler films are all studies in the link between neurosis and creativity and portray the artist not merely as a social outcast, unfit really for society, but as a martyr to his own talent, which inevitably consumes him. "Mahler" (1974), as fantastic as portions of it might be, maintains the closest marriage with reality. Robert Powell (famously Jesus in Zeffirelli's film of that name) as Mahler represents perfect casting. For one thing, he looks the part. British beauty Georgina Hale (where is she twenty-five years later?) is alternately innocent and whorish as Alma Schindler, who, twenty years younger, became Mahler's wife only to betray him, as Mahler perhaps betrayed her, too. There is enough neurosis in their story to go around. Russell gives us not so much a straight narrative as a series of vignettes in flashback from Mahler's point of view as he returns by train to Vienna for the last time in 1911, the year of his death. Using Bernard Haitink's recordings of the Mahler symphonies (with the Concertgebouw Orchestra), Russell illustrates the music in the visual fantasies or episodes that make up the film. Examples? To the apocalyptic "organ chord" from the First Movement of the Tenth Symphony, we see Mahler's lakeside hut at Maiernegg burst into flames; then a cocooned female figure gradually emerges from her chrysalis in a weird ballet. To the death-march on "Frère Jacques" from the First Symphony, with its interruptions by an oompah-ing klezmer band, we see Mahler watching his own funeral and interment helplessly, his coffin carried by black-uniformed SS men while Alma, in matching SS miniskirt and jackboots, does a lewd dance on the grave. In a crucifixion scene accompanied by bleeding chunks from Wagner's "Ring," Cosima Wagner, the Mistress of Bayreuth,gives him a pass for being circumcised, then compels him to eat pork, thus licensing him to conduct the most Teutonic of Teutonic music. (This follows the announcement of the composer's conversion to Catholicism - as I said, nothing is too vulgar for Russell.) For the "Veni, Creator Spiritus" from the Eighth Symphony, Russell gives us a cinematic suite of Gustave Doré engravings based on Dante's "Paradiso." And so it goes. At one point, a reporter claiming to be "Ernst Krenek" bursts into Mahler's Pullman compartment. (The real Ernst Krenek would have been about three years old at the time.) What holds the sequence together is the music in combination with Powell's remarkable performance. He even convinces when he undertakes the thankless job of conducting an unseen (and of course nonexistent) orchestra for the camera. (We all do it, but none of us wants to be photographed while doing it.) While room remains for as less surreal treatment of Mahler, Russell's, despite its eccentricity, is still a worthy attempt. Aficionados of Mahler will especially want to have it. I recommend it with the cautions implicit in what has gone before.

Mahler was a great Ken Russell film. It should have been presented correctly on DVD. Instead what we get is a washed out, blurry, scratched up mess. The sound is bad and the beauty of the cinematography is totally lost. This would be laughable if it weren't a shame. Honestly, the VHS version of this film blows the DVD away (huh?). Mr. Russell was a pioneer in his time and respected by people who enjoyed his mischievous touch. This film needs to be redone by someone who cares!

Anyone knowing about Ken Russell's films knows to expect something a little eccentric. With "Mahler," he does not disappoint. For the lover of unusual films, as well as Mahler's grand orchestral canvases, this film provides many delights.

A convalescing Gustav Mahler (Robert Powell) ponders his life while on a train trip with his wife Alma (Georgina Hale), who is having an affair with a military officer. While it covers certain events from his life, including the misery and tragedy of his childhood, the film's real strengths derive from its more fantastical aspects. Russell examines the composer's psyche in some bizarre, anachronistic, and sometimes darkly humorous vignettes, some of which have to do with Mahler's Jewishness in anti-Semitic "fin de siecle" Austria. Some highlights: Mahler debasing himself to prove his worthiness to a B&D clad Cosima Wagner during the musical number "Jewboy," sung to a very familiar tune by her husband; seeing his own funeral with Nazi pallbearers, a nude Alma frolicking to the playfully nightmarish Scherzo from his own Seventh Symphony; and his own frolics with what appears to have been his true love, Death.

Despite being the protagonist, Mahler is not completely a hero. Russell also examines Mahler's autocratic attitude towards his wife's composing, culminating in her burying her own compositions. The music selected for this scene is not by Mahler, but rather a Wagner piece with a very appropriate title. Perhaps this explains Mahler's phantasmic vision of Alma frolicking at his own funeral; does Russell have Mahler realize the delusion of consigning Alma exclusively to the role of muse, rather than leaving her to define herself as another creator?

Having seen Russell's film, the prospect of a straight biopic about "events" in Mahler's life seems to me rather anticlimactic. Anyone wishing to see a straight biopic of Mahler should probably avoid this film. (You may wish to wait for a movie currently in the works about Alma Mahler.) However, those with an appreciation for unusual films and/or Mahler's music should give this film serious consideration.

It is amazing how the company putting out this DVD could get away with selling such poor picture quality. There is a noticeable blur that accompanies most tracking shots, the picture is grainy, the colors are rather dull, and seems digitally transferred from an old VHS copy. And do not believe ads calling this a "widescreen" edition. It is standard screen size, possibly because it was never filmed in a widescreen format to begin with. The VHS version may be a bit better, but those with the illusion that DVD is always synonymous with superior quality -- BEWARE!

All right, I'll admit I'm a big Ken Russell fan from way back, although many of his films are flawed. Yes, he can be excessive (q.v. "Tommy") or overly obscure (q.v. "Women in Love"). But, when he gets it right, he gets it, and "Mahler" is one of his films where reality and his flights of fantasy balance each other perfectly. Centering around what is probably Mahler's last journey home, the composer and his much younger wife have been having a bumpy time of it. While she ponders dumping him for a young Austrian soldier, Mahler's medical condition sends him on a series of flashbacks and fantasies through his own life.

A highlight of the film (often edited out in American editions for some reason) is Mahler's "conversion" sequence, when he trades Judaism for Catholicism as a career move -- and the whole thing is imagined with Mahler as a David-esque warrior, approaching the lair of Cosima Wagner, who's resplendent in Wagnerian/Nazi drag. Yes, it may seem anachronistic -- unless you know your European History. (Russell's next film, "Lisztomania," also played with the whole Nietszche/Wagner/Supermen will become Nazis idea, but far less successfully.)

Anyway... "Mahler" is a funny and moving film that weaves time, memory and emotion to explore how an artist got where he is, and does it with beautiful imagery, imagination and, most of all, the incredible music of Mahler himself. It's definitely worth a look and a listen.

Ken Russell was a controversial, daring and bold director of modernism back in the late 60's and through the 70's. His films were disturbing to watch for many and so crammed with bizarre symbolism that it appeared to be inspired by hallucinations triggered by drug abuse. The horror film "The Devils" from 1971 was about witchcraft, Satanism and the Black Plague in early Renaissance France in which Vannessa Redgrave played a blasphemous nun. "Tommy" was a rock opera depicting the drug cultre and rock of the 70's. Lisztomania was a bio epic with a bizarre comic book twist on the life of pianist and composer Franz Liszt. Of all his films, Mahler is Russell's most restrained and most beautiful. It has minimal twists and bizarre symbols, except for the appropriate sections - the opening in which Mahler is dreaming of his wife as a struggling creature in a cocoon, witnessing his own death and his wife dancing over his grave and taking on lovers and the silent movie "The Convert" about Cosima Wagner converting Mahler from Jew to Catholic. This scene is hilarious as Cosima Wagner plays a Nazi dominatrix forcing him to eat pig (Still Kosher ?)making a parody of Wagner opera and the scene concludes with their singing of The Ride Of The Valkyries.

The true meat of the film is the music being used for the right scenes. Even an allusion to Visconti's version of A Death In Venice by Thomas Mann is made early in the film. There are many fine moments in the film. Among them is the scene in which Alma, Mahler's wife, buries her husband's 10th Symphony Score or perhaps something else that was never discovered to the romantic strains of Wagner's Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde. Cosima Wagner is the villain in the film, portrayed as a seductive, dark, mysterious temptress. Mahler did in fact convert to Catholicism simply to get the job of conductor of the Vienna State Opera. Anti-Semitism was a popular movement during this time and Cosima Wagner, the widow of the late Richard Wagner, was notoriously Anti-Semitic. Another powerful scene is Mahler explaining Heaven and Hell, angels and demons to his two daughters. Illustrations by Gustav Dore are depicted. Also moving is the scene towards the end in which Alma protects her daughters from a coming storm and from the allure of the evil Cosima Wagner who apparently has already bewitched Mahler. The conflicts of the film are two: Mahler and his inner conflict. He was Jewish, betrayed his faith to gain fame as conductor (He was the lead conductor of the world next to Arturo Toscanini in the Metropolitan Opera of New York City during the 1908-1910 seasons.) His obscession with Death, his fascination with the natural world and the loss of children's innocence, hence his work for voice Songs On The Death Of Children. The music here from the symphonies is well done and conducted by Bernard Haitink. It is a beautiful if bizarre film.

Or at least the best that I've seen. A very amusing, highly satirical film. It's not a straight-forward biography, but rather it tries to capture the important milestones in Mahler's life. Russell introduces a number of sly references to other films including Visconti's 'Death in Venice'. Russell doesn't make Mahler an entirely sympathetic character especially in his treatment of Alma, but he does bring out their love and devotion for each other. Also, Mahler's nonchalant discarding of his Jewishness to gain a position at the Vienna State Opera doesn't make him particularly admirable. The scene in which he placates Cosima Wagner is very funny and may not please some Wagnerites. Watch for the various Wagnerian icons there! Other segments I liked were the dream funeral and the interview with Hugo Wolf. Robert Powell is a handsome and intense Mahler, and the boy who plays young Mahler is, for once, not conventionally cute. I don't know what the complaint about the DVD is, but mine seems quite all right.

Bizarre but Beautiful , June 19, 2005
Okay, this film does appear very strange at times, as it shows Austrian composer Gustav Mahler smashing a Star of David, taking a sword to symbolically kill a dragon (the old traditional German masters), and eating pork washed down with a mug of milk to show his renunciation of his Jewish roots, just to get ahead on the music scene.

If you can't stand an anachronistic Cosima Wagner goose-stepping back and forth to determine if Mahler is worthy to conduct in Vienna, then you should'nt watch this film.

But you'll be missing something valuable. Ken Russell captures Mahler the genius, who was both arrogant, and yet uncertain.

Many of Mahler's most beautiful themes are used throughout the film and always at appropriate places. It was in this way that the film captures Mahler's genius for taking what he hears in the natural world and tranforming it into his symphonies. Especially poignant was an English version of a song from Kindertotenlieder, which accompanies a nightmarish fleeing of Mahler's daughters through the forest during a storm.

A portion of a symphony which includes the sound of a rattle, is led into by Alma trying to quiet the Mahler children, shaking a rattle. Likewise one of the frightening "what the animals of the night tell me" phantom monsters of the Third Symphony, appears to young Gustav as a white horse terrifying him in as a very literal "night mare."

As one who believes Mahler was the greatest of the Romantic composers, and perhaps also a sort of musical philosopher or even theologian, I find more to enjoy in Ken Russell's Mahler each time I watch it. It's a little bizarre at times, but also very beautiful.

Two more quick comments: Robert Powell, the actor who plays Mahler, looks astonishingly like the composer.
The "bad transfer" which other reviewers have remarked about, has obviously been corrected, as current copies are perfect.

Ken Russell directed movies in the late 60's and throughout the 70's that were probably his best but highly controversial, bizarre, symbolic and disturbing to many people. The new age of rock had arrived, and a new culture that intended to "shock". His 1971 film "The Devils" is a horror piece about a nun and a priest who commit unholy acts and brings a village to mob hysteria. His 1975 "Tommy" musical was a rock opera and in the same years he also directed the bizarre and comic book style Lisztomania about the life of pianist Franz Liszt. Of all his movies, Mahler is his most restrained and most beautiful. It does not go over the top and does not have too many twists like his other movies. It is simply about the inner conflict of conductor/composer Gustav Mahler, his abandoning of his native Jewish faith and turning Catholic for the sake of his career and his troubled marriage to Alma Mahler. It is a psychological, introspective movie, entirely in Mahler's mind which evidently Russell believed he understood. Robert Powell plays the tormented composer who as the film opens is having a dream about himself as rock and his wife Alma as a struggling creature in a cacoon. Later, we discover Alma feels unhappy because she is nothing to Mahler whose career he values more than anything and she is living under his shadow. The sequence in which she is dressed and veiled in black amidst the crowd represents this sentiment. The train scenes are all well made, including a segment early in the film that alludes to "A Death In Venice" which was a 1971 Visconti film based on the book by Thomas Mann.

Appropriately during this scene, Mahler's Adagietto from Symphony. No. 5 is playing.Gustav Mahler composed music of bold and modern late Romantic style. His music is grandiose, calling for a large orchestra and using choruses in the vein of Beethoven's Ninth. He shared conducting positions with Arturo Toscanini, long considered the greatest conductor of all time, during the Metropolitan Opera season of 1908-1910, mentioned in the film. Mahler's obscession with death is revealed as he has a disturbing dream that he dies but is able to see that his wife dances over his grave and takes on new lovers. This segment is pretty vulgar stuff as Alma dances in the nude. The symphonies are incredibly suited to the scenes in the movie. The Symphony No. 10, which was Mahler's last and which was unfinished, is played as his wife Alma buries the score in the woods at night. With his marriage falling apart, Mahler turns to Cosima Wagner, the wife of the late Richard Wagner. Notoriously Anti-Semitic, she does not allow Mahler to conduct at the prestigious Vienna State Opera unless he converts to Catholicism. During a silent film parody his "conversion" is portrayed in the funny, slapstick, blasphemous Ken Russell manner. Cosima is a Nazi dominatrix urging Mahler to leave behind his Jewish faith and even eating a pig (Still Kosher...?) the scene concludes with Cosima and Mahler singing original lyrics composed for the Ride Of The Valkyries in a mock Wagner Opera. If you can go beyond these banal scenes, you will see how beautiful the movie really is. I especially liked the part in which to the English translation of the Songs On The Death Of Children, Cosima and Mahler stroll through their lake property near the woods, a storm breaks out and Alma hurries to protect her daughters. A brilliant, beautiful if bizarre film.