NIGHT TRAIN TO LISBON
Germany, 2013, 116 minutes, Colour.
Jeremy Irons, Martina Geddeck, Jack Huston, Melanie Laurent, Tom Courtenay, August Diehl, Bruno Gana, Lena Olin, Charlotte Rampling, Christopher Lee.
Directed by Bille August.
Out of Competition.
Based on a novel by Pascale Mercier, this film has two time levels. While it starts on a bridge and in a classroom in Bern, after the trip on the night train, most of the action takes place in Portugal, in the present and in the early 1970s during the dictatorship of Salazar and the revolution against his regime.
The present. Teacher Jeremy Irons saves a woman from jumping off the Bern bridge. When she runs from his classroom, she leaves her coat and, in a pocket, a book by a Portuguese doctor/philosopher which intrigues him. The bookseller tells him the girl had a ticket for Lisbon. Impulsively, something he never does, he boards the train. After settling into a hotel in Lisbon, he begins his search for the author and learns about the 1970s resistance. He finds the author’s repressed sister, Adriana (Charlotte Rampling) who had collected her brother’s notes and published them, then learns that Amadeu, the brother has been dead for decades. His search takes him to a priest who taught him and buried him (Christopher Lee). After being knocked down by a cyclist, he needs new glasses. The friendly optometrist, Mariana (Martina Gedeck) takes him to her uncle in a retirement home, Joao (Tom Courtenay), a close friend and ally of Amadeu (Jack Huston). Eventually, he finds Jorge, Amadeu’s closest friend (Bruno Ganz) and gradually puts the pieces together.
The past. Schoolfriends, Amadeu and Jorge, the former’s conservative judge father and Adriana. We see Amadeu making a daring speech at school at Jorge’s insistence. This is all shown in flashbacks to meetings, arrests and torture, daring escapes. We also meet Estefania (Melanie Laurent) who keeps addresses and phone numbers in her accurate memory and is a threat to the regime.
The trouble with this kind of production is that it is like the European Union. What emerges is a kind of (sometimes lumpy) Europudding, something like other Bille August films, The House of the Spirits and his Les Miserables (1998). A German production with a Danish director. Cast from Germany, England, France, Sweden, Portugal and sometimes a hotchpotch of accents, the British affecting a kind of broken English accent. Characters who speak clearly when they are young like Jorge (August Diehl) then becoming heavy accented (Bruno Ganz) or Melanie Laurent becoming Lena Olin.
Still, the plot is interesting. Lisbon looks beautiful and the film does offer the opportunity to learn something about the mid-20th century history of Portugese politics.
1. An international production? European? The differences in contributions, languages, accents? Continuity from younger to older presentations of characters?
2. Bern, Raimund at home, on the Bern Bridge the attempted suicide? The girl and his rescue? The beauty of Lisbon, the vistas, the bridge, the streets, the hotel, institutions?
3. The film spanning two eras? Modern times? The past, the 1970s? Homes, streets, the dictatorship? Torture and prison? The scenes in Spain? The musical score?
4. The title, the atmosphere?
5. Raimund, waking, ready for school, his routine, alone, gathering his papers? Walking over the bridge? Seeing the girl, the rescue, gathering the papers? Taking her to class? Leaving her coat? The book? Tracking the girl down, going to the book shop, the information about the train to Lisbon, going to the station, the pressure of time, the principal and the phone calls, the impulse decision to travel?
6. Lisbon, the hotel, the friendly landlord?
7. Going to the house, meeting Adriana, talking with her, her publishing the book, denying her brother’s death? A repressed woman? Seeing her in the past, possessive of her brother, the death of her father? Her brother walking out and over her?
8. The maid in giving Raimund and the information, his going to the cemetery? His reading the texts from the book, philosophy, existential reflections, the intercutting of these quotations throughout the film? The audience’s capacity for hearing them, understanding and appreciating them?
9. Raimund and his being run down by the cyclist, having to get new glasses, meeting Mariana, her friendliness, the story of the revolution, her uncle, her taking him to see the uncle in the institution, talking, reminiscing? The institution, whether the uncle should have cigarettes or not? Memories, the friends in the past, Amadeu the, Jorge, the uncle’s arrest, playing the piano, the beating of his fingers? Memories of the literacy class, having the gun, arrested, prison? His wanting information in the present?
10. The atmosphere of the 1970s, Salazar and his dictatorship, the secret police, the raids, the arrests, torture? Menzel and his reputation?
11. The visit to the priest, old, the discussions, visiting the classroom, Amadeu and his career, at school, the speech and the priest’s reaction, his being
part of the establishment? With Amadeu’s parents? His burying Amadeu? Amadeu as a free spirit?
12. Raimund and his tracking Jorge, the pharmacy, the chess the clash, Raimund’s return, the coffee, Jorge telling the story, love for Estefania, the class, the escape, Amadeu and his love for Estefania, his seeing the couple kiss, threatening them with the gun, unable to shoot, his upset, his continuing his life in Lisbon, the same pharmacy, and the gift of the pharmacy from Amadeu?
