Thursday, October 29, 1998
Ragged peasants inherit master’s riches in movie
FILM: Brilliant direction, talented cast pass down
experiences to audience
By Ricky Herzog
Daily Bruin Contributor
A huge inheritance from someone you despise would seem to be an
unexpectedly wonderful blessing, but life is always more
complicated than that. Director Stefan Ruzowitzky builds a complex
social drama on this intriguing premise.
"The Inheritors" is a brilliant, almost mythical tale of seven
Austrian peasants who, after their cruel master’s mysterious
murder, inherit his entire farm. Set in the timeless past, when a
strict social stratification governed the land, the peasants meet
the resistance of a community bent on upholding the status quo (in
other words, not allowing peasants to become important landowners
overnight). The powerful farmer Danninger (Ulrich Wildgruber)
becomes their main opponent, pushing them down at every possible
turn. Along the way, Ruzowitzky aptly chronicles the peasant’s
hopes, mistakes, triumphs and tragedies. As the film comes to a
head, one intensely dramatic night shapes their lives forever.
In the hands of a lesser director, "The Inheritors" could easily
have slipped into an over-sentimentalized account of the plight of
the peasant. Ruzowitzky, however, always maintains a firm control
over the film. He deftly incorporates various perspectives, fleshed
out characters and beautiful, natural cinematography.
Being largely an ensemble film, the cast, made up of Austrian
stage and film actors, has the difficult task of holding the film
together with powerful, believable chemistry and interaction. They
more than live up to the job, as each character is infused with a
complexity and fullness all their own.
As Emmy, the intelligently determined peasant woman constantly
standing up to a community trying to suppress her, Sophie Ross
delivers the film’s stand-out performance, giving her character
strength, pride, vulnerability and morality all at once.
The narrator Severin (Lars Rudolph) provides the film’s outside
perspective, as a city man who has moved back to the country and
reflects upon the events around him. Though he has comparatively
little screen time, Rudolph manages to turn what could have been a
simple "everyman" character into an emotionally complex human. And
as the peasant’s nemesis and a symbol of old world rigidity,
Danninger (Ulrich Wildbruger) has a grandly commanding screen
presence that evokes a shiver of fear each time he appears.
The brilliance of "The Inheritors," aside from stellar directing
and acting, is that it defies genre; it plays out as a morality
tale, psychological drama, mythical history and class struggle
rolled into one. Though set in the past, the themes and struggles
depicted in the film are universal, giving it a timeless relevance.
Quite simply, Ruzowitzky has created a small masterpiece.
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