Too much of everything

Masterful Movie

Fantastic!

One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)Slaughterhouse-Five, by Oscar Award-winning director George Roy Hill, does a beautiful job of visually depicting the incredibly bizarre, guiltily comical, and thought provoking work of its literary counterpart by Kurt Vonnegut. Billy Pilgrim, a nothing-out-of-the-ordinary World War II veteran played by Michael Sacks, recounts his, and subsequently Vonnegut's, experiences from the war, particularly the horrific fire bombing of the German city of Dresden. The characters of Pilgrim's overweight wife Valencia (Sharon Gans), son Robert (Perry King), and daughter Barbara (Holly Near) all help to create the idea of a normal American family, unmarred by the atrocities of war. Billy's seeming lunacy is a stark contrast to their normalcy. Both the film and book travel through different times of Billy's life, due to his obsession with the Tralfamadorian concept of time, and also his attempt to cope with traumatic experiences by revisiting past events. Although dramatically "time-tripping" through three general periods of time, the movie does manage to convey a chronological progression of happenings, escaping from past stressful or violent circumstances to dwell in more peaceful or happier times in the present. In the war, Billy, then serving as a chaplain's assistant, is captured behind enemy lines during the famous Battle of the Bulge, and becomes a prisoner of war. He and the fellow P.O.W.s, including fatherly Edgar Derby (Eugene Roche), vulgar Roland Weary (Kevin Conway) and bloodthirsty Paul Lazarro (Ron Leibman) are shuffled into a German prisoner of war camp, and then packed like animals into train cars bound for Dresden, Germany. Once in Dresden, they are introduced to their new home, and the novel's namesake, Slaughterhouse-Five, an abandoned slaughterhouse sixty feet underground. Throughout the movie, one may observe that much of the music used is upbeat classical music, a stark contrast to the brutal background of war. The entire soundtrack consists of six pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach, which created what felt to me like an ironic tone. The music helps to transfer over Vonnegut's feeling of uncomfortableness that he creates in the novel. Also in the movie there are scenes where the sounds from one scene of Pilgrim's life are imposed on or intertwined with the sounds from another time. One instance of this is near the very beginning of the film when Billy sits at a typewriter, documenting his experiences on Tralfamadore. Each plunk of his finger on a key reverberates as a sharp gunshot and as he continues to type the sounds transform into an entire war scene and we have time-tripped into Billy's past. Right off the bat, I was wary of a film version of such a hauntingly strange novel, but after watching it I feel that George Roy Hill really managed to accurately create an incredible film based off an equally incredible book. Superior acting, a beautiful sound track, and thought- provoking characters and situations all combine to create a film like no other.

While the film falls shy of greatness, it certainly did deserve the awards it won, such as the Prix de Jury (3rd Place) at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival. And, given how many films from the 1960s and 1970s have been pigeon-holed, due to their cultural limitations, it's refreshing to see a film that reflects its era- the 1940s through 1970s, yet does not wallow in it. While one can argue with the film's philosophical posit that everything is connected and predetermined, the presentation, or the art, of the ideas, is excellent. On a personal level, one of the things I find most refreshing about this film is how there is not a single character in it that looks like a movie star. All the main and supporting character roles are played by average looking actors. I sometimes just get tired of looking at films where, even if good acting is involved (such as the films of a Michelangelo Antonioni or Federico Fellini, much less the schlock that Hollywood cranks out), the people all look like perfect mannekins. Another refreshing thing about this film is that it's one of the rare examples of a film (especially considering it was a big studio Hollywood film) set in World War Two era Europe that has nothing to do with the Nazi genocide of European Jews. It's simply next to impossible to make a film on the Holocaust that does not fall into terminal PC preachiness. This film, however, shows the war from a unique perspective; one where humor and the flaws of individuals are on full display, rather than the stridency of a political ax to grind.Slaughterhouse-Five may or may not be a great film (I vote no), but it is a film worth watching. While it does not break as much ground in its art form as its source material does in its, it is a film that sticks with the viewer, forcing one to cogitate upon what it has imparted, Whether or not that means one is time tripping like Billy Pilgrim is up for debate.'Poo-tee-weet.'

.Iconic author Kurt Vonnegut falls in a similar category as other well known authors who's novel gets adapted from movies and leaves critics wondering if they will keep up with what was written in their novels. Vonnegut's novels are provocative in the sense that which we utilize our cognitive state of mind as we challenge the madness behind mankind's ways of thinking. Surely not suited for audience members to go to theaters just to be entertained.Such experiments of trying to bring a qualitative novel to the big screen has been a victim of utter failure over the years (like "Slapstick" for example). But with the dedicated skill and bravery of competent director George Roy Hill, it is safe to say that "Slaughterhouse-Five" was given life to the screen without anyone feeling any sense of insult or humiliation and leaves its audience the freedom to draw their own conclusions of what was revealed here. Overall it was a pleasant compliment to Vonnegut's work and deserves all the praises it's been given to fans and critics. The characters in the movie were everything that I expected from the novel Theperformances were just as special in bringing the novel to life.Michael Sacks was really believable in his performance as Billy Pilgrimand Sharon Gans was convincing as his rotund and domineering wife,Valenica Pilgrim. Billy has become withdrawn with his time, shiftingback and forth of his life From the catastrophic events of World War IIto the generic struggles of married life, the film succeeds in shiftingthe radom events chronologically way up where we find Mr. Pilgrimlocated on the nearby planet of Tralfamadore along with a scantily cladMontana wildhack (Valerie Perrine). The accuracy speaks volumes towardsthe numerous supporting characters that was well complimented fromVonnegut's novel.Novice Vonnegut fanatics might be turned of by the unsettling narrative, but the detail that was taken into consideration might even flabbergast the average moviegoer after this equally poignant Vonnegut movie adaptation..

An elderly Billy Pilgrim sits and writes his memoirs at a rickety old typewriter. To say that he has lead a very interesting life is an understatement, to say that his life makes for an interesting movie is a little more arguable.As Billy taps away at the keys the film drifts in and out of various times in Billy's life, ranging from his childhood all the way up until he is abducted by aliens and forced to live on another planet wiling away the time banging a Hollywood star.You read that right - this is not just a WW2 film.The bulk of the time though focuses on Billy's wartime experience - Slaughterhouse-5 refers to the former abattoir that Billy and fellow POWs are imprisoned in located in supposedly peaceful Dresden - and the years following his return home where he marries and raises a family. In between there is some action, but not much. What is there includes a plane crash, combat, internment and the UFO abduction thing, but nothing is exceptionally big or "Wow", even the war scenes aren't very "war-ey"..It is all quite well edited and seamlessly moves through the eras backwards and forwards, which takes a bit of getting used to as you think where is he now, once you see Billy's gap toothed mug and gauge his age you catch up quick though. It did add one funny joke where Billy's slightly chunky and annoying wife told him in every era how she planned to lose weight to make him happy - then we progress forward and find out that she never did, more unfortunately for old Bill is that she continued to be as annoying...Slaughterhouse-5 is practically unknown nowadays - it is 30+ years old - and it is no doubt weird. Just not weird enough to make it notably weird like say Eraserhead or Dark Star even though it is far better than both. I guess at the end of the day unknown-weird is still no more than unknown.The fact of the matter is that while it is pretty interesting and well made Slaughterhouse-5 has no one scene that differentiates it from the pack. You keep waiting for it to have the big reveal and explain everything but it never does.You probably should admire that as a movie watcher, but is it enough cause to hunt down this unassuming oddity from 4 decades ago? The answer is No, not really.Final Rating - 5 / 10. Not a terrible film, but nothing really going for it enough to provide cause for recommendation.