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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Worth Watching...Once, September 22, 2003
This review is from: Quintet [VHS] (VHS Tape)
Well, so far as I can tell, Paul Newman has never been in a bad movie, and after watching this I still believe it. Quintet isn't bad, its just not particularly entertaining (I fell asleep halfway through and had to do some rewinding). Its pace is glacial (seriously...very slow moving). During the second Ice Age, a seal-hunter named Essex (Newman) takes his pregnant young wife Vivia to the City where his brother lives, only to have his family fall victim to an assassin's hand. Essex chases down the fleeing killer, but somebody beats him to the punch. The rest of the movie is basically Essex trying to discover the reason for the killings. Sort of a sci-fi mystery, but interwoven with heavy philosophical rhetoric. I rented this after reading a lot of the reviews here and was expecting a nearly incomprehensible art house movie. But, if you're paying attention, its really not that complex or alienating -and its slowness serves the world it depicts. This is an Ice Age and nobody is doing a lot of moving around. `Quintet' refers on one level to the game these Ice Agers play to pass the time until their eventual demise (apparently those of child-bearing age have mostly passed on, and those left are not trying anymore). It basically involves `killing' your opponent's pieces in a contest to see who will face the `sixth man' at the end. The problem is, somebody is taking the game beyond the board... Good movie with a satisfying ending and much about the nature of existence (`life is a brief respite between the void before birth and the void after death, so treasure your experiences and your hardships...' I'm paraphrasing), but with the pace of `Dune.' A recommended rental for a slow Saturday or Sunday morning or for the more adventurous, midnight hour screening.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
So Depressing It's Good, October 8, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: Quintet [VHS] (VHS Tape)
Quintet is the type of film one can watch when one is at the bottom level of a melancholia...and actually enoy it! The movie is ponderous, philosophical, and slow moving, but the concept is so blatantly bizarre and cold blooded that it works! In Quintet, a future ice-age has wiped out most of humanity, and the survivors whittle along their final era in broken down cities. Along comes outsider Newman into the scheme of things. He hasn't the slightest idea what is going on, and what's up is a board game turned into a killing tournament. You see, the ice has krept into people's veins, and they need that good ol' adrenalin rush to make life seem real! The hidden details of the film are absorbing. The lack of humanity and emotion in these ice-agers is obvious (not bad acting). Their emotions are truly frozen. Also, look for signs that the ice age might be actually ending....while these denizens are playing end-of-the world games! I love the ending and the subtlety of the film. Some relationships really do end like Newman and Andersson's!
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent SciFi from an Unlikely source, September 21, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: Quintet [VHS] (VHS Tape)
Intelligent and well concieved SciFi from Altman. The world is dying. Glaciers have descended to engulf cities. A few heavily swaddled people have survived to create new power balances and priorities in the burnt-out husk of a culture. Infertile and without hope they await death while playing a dangerous gambling game called Quintet. One is reminded of Doris Lessing's "The Making of the Representative of Plant 8". The city is gorgeously created on the old site of Expo '67 - Montreal's World Fair. Dim lightbulbs hollow out melted rounds of ice inside the rooms. Excellent SciFi.
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