Customer Reviews

Songs from the Second Floor

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What is this film about ? It is about strange things happening in a strange city ? What is this absurd traffic that cars are stuck in for days, without moving even for a few feet ? Where is everybody going ? What went wront with the magicians act and almost killed the volunteer from the audience ?

In short what is Anderson trying to say ? A lot. And it is all an alegory about the human life. Trapped in convention, in relations, like being stuck in the traffic, working hard and as the hero says "try to put some food on the table, and enjoy oneself". It is also a criticism of the establishment and power. When people trust their lives in authority that is supposed to take care of them, like trusting that the magician will not cut you in half but will make the trick work, but things go wrong. Like when a mental patient is wearing the doctor's robe and nobody understands the difference.

The imagery of the film is stunning to say the least, the photography, the colors, the camera that never moves, the ever lasting deep focus that captures foreground and background and does not miss anything. Oh, this is a masterpiece. It reminded me of Tarkofski, although lighter and more approachable, and also Angelopoulos, although not so slow.

I would recomend this film to everyone. And if you are puzzled at the end about what it all means you will get a lot of answers on the special features section where you can see the entire film from the beginning with the director explaining his concept and answering questins about the technical aspects of the film and about its message.

One of the best films of the past 10 years I would say.

I first saw this film IIRC in 2001 at the Roger Ebert Overlooked Film Festival ("Ebertfest") in Champaign-Urbana. I instantly fell in love with the film -- it was clearly the best film at the festival. And then I waited for DVD release... and waited... and waited. Finally I received my copy, some 4+ years after the film was released.

Upon watching it again, I felt it lost something compared to the presentation on the massive screen and enthusiastic 800+ audience at the Virginia Theatre. The visuals are intentionally drab, but incredibly rich and detailed; hence, the small screen is not kind. Also, like much absurdist art, it is difficult to recapture the emotional shock and wonderment of the first viewing. But yet the movie is still compelling on DVD.

This Swedish comedy is dark, brooding, irreverent and often times disturbing. From the grey skies to the traffic-jammed streets to the predominantly obese and ashen-faced cast, this movie makes no attempt to be be pretty or cheery. However, certain scenes of despair are so full of beauty, one smiles despite oneself. I am reminded of certain scenes from the work of Terry Gilliam.

The plot is rather simple: things are not going well in this fictional Scandinavian city and the citizens are getting desperate. Don't ask why or where -- it's truly unimportant. Woven into this fabric is Caesar Vallejo's poem "Beloved be the man who sits down," the verses of which form a a type of modern beatitudes extolling the merits of the mundane individual. In the movie, the poem is written by the protaganist's son, who now resides in a mental hospital. Ironically, the people in the patients in the mental hospital appear to be the only sane residents in a city gone loopy as capitalism, government and religion fail its increasingly desperate and selfish citizens.

A great film to see, but really not for everyone.

Songs From the Second Floor is the best film I've seen in a long time. The movie is unconventional in that it has no plot and is filled with a number of events that don't always follow one another.

I think the primary focus of the film however is on the man whose picture appears on the box cover. In the beginning of the film he burns down his furnature store in order to collect insurance money. He also has a son who drove himself crazy writing poetry. After he burned down his business, he trys to make a living selling crucifixes.

Along our journey in this film we see a number of people who are either in great dispair, suffering or are on the verge of a mental collapse. Along our journey in life, we experience pretty much what is shown in this film. I love this film because it vividly shows what life is like but at the same time it's very dream-like. What is life but one mishap or mistake after another?

The film is also very funny. The part in particular which made me laugh was when there was a scene when a man had just been apparently fired from his job then he clings on to his bosses leg like a kid repeating the same thing over and over again.

What can I say. This movie will strike a chord with anyone who is disenfranchised with modern western society.

In a series of vignettes, some hilarious, some disturbing, people of a nameless western european city go through the motions of life. A man's business fails, another gets fired and breaks down pitifully while others look on and a girl is forced to walk the plank for a corporation.

I really liked the use of makeup to convey how lifeless these people are. They are all completely devoid of colour.

I know this review doesn't give you much of an idea of what the film is like but it is just so different from most other cinematic experiences that it defies description.

Bottom line: If you liked 'Titanic' stay away but if you enjoy avant garde film making that isn't afraid to use heavy doses of metaphor to convey the message, you will enjoy this film.

It's disgraceful that this film took so long to reach America; and still more disgraceful that it will play in only a few major cities. I caught it in NYC, and it's a superb mixture of Luis Bunuel, Jean Marie Straub and Godard. Andersson moves his camera exactly once in the entire film (a slow tracking shot), as he chronicles a series of interconnected episodes documenting corporate greed, the commodification of religion, the hopelessness of faith in "compassionate government," and creates a film (his second in 24 years!) that is resonant, funny as hell, and deeply moving.

After his first feature, Andersson turned to directing commercials for Swedish television (Ingmar Bergman calls them his favorite examples of contemporary filmmaking), and then sank all of his own money into creating Songs From The Second Floor, eventually obtaining outside financing to finish the film. Think of what Terry Gilliam or Monty Python as a whole might have accomplished if they had any real talent or insight, and you'll get some idea of the genius of this film. An absolute must see, currently available only on VHS in PAL format in the UK. Should be released on DVD in the US immediately; this is one of most important and deeply felt films of the new century.

Let me begin by saying this is one of the most striking films I have managed to catch in a while and that, for that reason alone, film buffs will not want to miss it. It has an attention to detail that is rarely found, and makes repeated viewings worthwhile However, even for those who are not necessarily interested in "artsy" films, there are still good reasons to see this film.

One reviewer below notes that, having listened to the director's commentary about the symbolic meaning of much of what is going on in the film, that this reduces it to being "marginally interesting". There's a great deal of truth in this, and makes for an excellent reason not to listen to the director's commentary, especially as a creator's intentions may not always provide the best insight into a work. Sometimes a work can be greater, or the effect can be meaningful in ways that a director or writer may not realize. For example, there are a number of images in the film about the indifferent powers-that-be, who are so heartless at one point as to actually sacrifice a girl in a superstitious ritual to try to save their failing world; in another, at a business meeting, a gypsy fortune-teller passes around a crystal ball. To reduce this to merely a commentary on specific current Swedish social policies threatens to remove the relevance of the image for all of us in industrialized nations.

Whatever the case of this, the primary reason to see this movie is for its very striking images, and the specific content of each scene. In each (with one exception), the camera never moves; there are no cuts (except between scenes), no shifts of perspective. One watches each scene from a single point of view always. This is hardly noticeable at first, if at all, because the action very much "fills the frame" set by the motionless camera. Moreover, because the camera does not move, the director sets up each shot so there is tremendous depth to it, going far into the distance. He utilizes this depth brilliantly, and this helps to keep the film "moving".

For example, at one point a father and son are visiting another son in a mental hospital. The "crazy" poet-son sits in the extreme foreground; his brother mulls on the right nearby, and the father is behind them both, delivering a monologue. On the left, stands a psychologist in a white doctor's coat with a clipboard, looking uncertain and confused. The setting is a long, long hallway, with two archways, painted in white and a faint shade of beige or yellow (I'm trying to remember the color from memory). As the father's monologue continues, from the very end of the hallway, a man in a dark blue shirt walks up with two more orderlies. Paying no attention to the father or his son, the man in the blue shirt says to the doctor, "What did I tell you about my lab coat? Give it back," or something like that. Suddenly, you realize that the "doctor" is actually a mental patient. He resists, and the orderlies must wrestle the coat off of him, then walk off with the man in the blue shirt.

This is what reviewers mean by quirky (I assume), this sudden shift of expectations--from "doctor" to "crazy person". Of course, this serves as a commentary on the state of psychiatric medicine as well, but that's much less obvious than the startling humor of the scene. At the same time, the father's monologue is becoming a rant (he ultimately is ushered away by orderlies as well--more "symbolism" that "normal" is "crazy" and the "crazy" son must be normal, if one wants to read it that way), so that the emotional effect of the father's rant is colored by, overshadowed by, modified by the startling humor of the blue-shirted man's interaction with the hospital patient. It makes for a very heady brew of images and effects--and this level of surprise is maintained throughout the entire film, from the opening scene to the last.

This film was apparently very expensive to make--and this shows in the pain-staking level of detail, and that everything was built--computer graphics were not relied upon, there were many, many takes of scenes. This detail, however, is not limited only to the visuals of the film. The details continue down to the very words spoken. As such, it is unfair to describe this film as "random" or having no plot

I can think of three ways one might view the plot of this film. First, as the symbolic story that is being told by the director about the state of Swedish affairs--this involves diatribes against those in power, mindless (zombie-like) hordes of business people, practicing superstitious gestures (like flagellation, child sacrifice, divination) to save their failing world, broadsides on education, and most of all the justifications by those in power for what they have done. The whole movie threads together along this otherwise "invisible" subtext. Of course, there is no need to watch the film this way. The beautiful surrealism and ambiguous implications of Anderson's crystal-clear imagery alone suggests that turning the thing into this kind of literal allegory is, indeed, only marginally interesting.

A second way to watch the film is at "face-value," as almost a kind of political zombie movie. The movie's second scene shows a long-time employee being fired in an exceptionally Kafkaesque way. This is followed by a foreigner being beaten up by hostile natives. What I gather from this is that "something is wrong with the world." Thus, the main character enters, on a subway, covered in soot, as all of the other passengers open their mouths, and chorale music pours out. Gradually, we learn that the man has burned down his shop for the insurance money and it seems clear enough that this is a response to the disintegration of the world around him. And so on. What particularly makes this into a "plot" that one can follow, is that it all seems related to his alternating sense of guilt (that he and others like him have made the world into the crazy place it has become) and trying to justify himself, especially to his son the poet, who has also gone "crazy".

And the last way to watch the film is simply for the vignettes presented in each scene--their visual sumptuousness and detail. This might ultimately seem to make the whole movie disjointed or fragmented, but even that could be said to be a commentary on modern life. Regardless, each scene is a multi-faceted and sparkling gem itself, so that it is not even necessary to string all these gems together into a necklace.

However one views the film, it may be something of a shame that the oddness or quirkiness of the film might be off-putting enough to some to not stick with it for the duration. In its small way, the motionless camera actually helps, since one does not become distracted by shifts and cuts; the motionless camera draws attention to the motion of things in the film, which one's focus can alight upon. In any case, for those willing to expend some patience on this very striking film, the rewards are entirely there to be reaped.

Songs from the Second Floor is visually stunning as it esthetically illustrates a cynical view of the human existence. This view consists of a kaleidoscope of scenes that personify desire, fear, guilt, and anxiety among other human traits. These human characteristics are symbolically tied up with the everlasting traffic jam that is depicted in the film as the characters are constantly unavailable for each other as they are trying to get somewhere better. This search could be a quest for happiness; however, the search itself might be the cause of the gloomy state of the characters. Songs from the Second Floor is based on a poem by Caesar Vallejo, and Andersson extracts the darkness of the verse as he brings a brilliant cinematic experience to the silver screen, which will cerebrally agonize the audience in a poetic and artistic manner.

Roy Andersson's Songs from the Second Floor mixes equal parts George Romero (esp. Night of the Living Dead), Samuel Beckett (esp. Endgame), Jean-Luc Godard (esp. Weekend), and very likely a few other cinematic allusions I didn't catch, resulting in this bizarre apocalyptic black humorous take on life as we know it.

A failed businessman torches his furniture store to collect the insurance money, then uses that money to invest in another business that fails. A young man writes poetry praising people who sit. A young girl is done away with in a sacrificial rite presided over by church officials. An enormous traffic jam blocks progress throughout an entire city. A dead man walks around seeking silent retribution. A business partner throws large crucifixes on a pyre. These are some of the more potent images that surface in this non-linear film that simultaneously fills the viewer with despair and absurdist merriment. What can we do? We're only human.

A voluptuous young woman having sex with a virile man stops to hear her name called out on the street. A homeless man rummages through street trash, immediately following which a passel of strange animals flees from the pile.

If this sounds like there's no plot, that's true. There really isn't. We follow, to some extent, the misadventures of Karl, the businessman, a large despairing man who bemoans his fate, finding himself in situations that may, from one perspective, test the viewer's patience, but when seen overall are ludicrous and at the same time oddly compelling and relentless. In an interesting set of extras, the director comments that he definitely did not want to make a Hollywood film in which a happy ending predominates, and that is certainly the case here. The entire film is a brilliant contemporary parable whose fitting ending is a perfect summation of both the entire film and the filmmaker's view of society.

The meaning of the title appears to be an ironic homage to religion--"second floor" referring to the view from above the street, that is, day-to-day life--or to the perspective of a creative artist who as well observes our behavior from an outside perspective and then offers his commentary on it. Religion itself is savagely skewered in this film, so this seems an appropriate interpretation.

Regardless, this is an excellent piece of filmmaking that is unique, strange, blackly humorous, bizarre, peculiar, and strongly resonant.

Definitely recommended.

Beutifull cinematography. Each scene could be a potography in a gallery. The pace and absurdity of the events render this film a poetic comedy/tragedy. The visula style and stationary camera highlights the irony and ridicule in modern life. The reviews here fail to emphasize how funny the sureal scenes are.

"It seems the whole town is on the road. Everyone going the same direction. Makes you wonder...where they are headed...the people." These are the words of a homeless man searching through a garbage pile who offers some of the bread he has found to a stranger. Meanwhile paranoid Kalle desperately tries to improve his livelihood...to "put food on the table, enjoy himself"; poets go mad; and tradesmen cannot sell the crucified Jesus. Government officials base their decisions on a gypsy fortuneteller and sacrifice a child to appease "the fate." Sounds absurd so far? There is more. People are stuck in a perpetual traffic jam with thousands dragging themselves on the streets. At first I thought they were flogging themselves, but actually they are whipping the backs of the people in front of them. And all this on a gray industrial background. The saddest thing is none of it looked absurd, but rather familiar. Try to get hold of this movie if you can.