I watched a feature the other day about this — it was an interview with the cinematographer. He explained that Clarke wanted to use very long lenses for this one, so everything is filmed from across the room.
Sounds logical.
So… this is about the French revolution — Robespierre is apparently launching a crusade against people behaving immorally. Danton is part of the revolution, but not pure enough? So this piece is mostly the two characters speechifying against each other (to respective friends etc).
Nothing much is explained — I think it’s assumed that you already know how the French revolution happened in some detail.
Ian Richardson isn’t just chewing the scenery here — he’s chewing the entire arrondissement.
But it suits the role.
But I have to say that I find this a crushing bore. And I usually like this sort of thing — it’s filmed theatre, so the bombast is part of the charm. But this is just so… it’s all caricatures, and we’re meant to pelt Robespierre with tomatoes.
And I don’t have any here!
The bits where they talk directly to the camera work well.
Wanamaker is great in this.
I found myself starting to read the article on Robespierre while watching this, just to understand what was going on — because it’s not a very didactic piece at all. So, that’s not an ideal way to watch this, and perhaps it’s awesome and stuff.
But I don’t think so.
Danton’s Death. Alan Clarke. 1978. ⚂
