So different, and yet so much the same...

Rating: 9/10 (11 February 2008)

The first thing that struck me as I started watching Barry Lyndon (which I'll admit that I knew almost nothing about when I put it on) was that it's a period film, something that I have definitely not come to expect from Kubrick. Granted, I'm a little behind in my detailed look at his filmography, given that more than a quarter century passed between the film's release and me finally getting around to watching it, but I very soon began to see the same Kubrick that I have come to know and love.
The film is about a man named Redmond Barry, who we love and then hate and then pity and then admire for his luck and then pity, love, hate, etc. And the most interesting thing about him, of course, is the sheer magnitude of events that happen to him, given that he never for one second has even the slightest bit of control over his own life.
He begins with a childish crush on his own cousin, which leads him to engage in a foolish duel, the results of which force him to flee his home without much plan of what to do with himself, other than make himself scarce until things blow over. And we witness the beginning of his truly bizarre adulthood, during which time he is robbed and forced to join the British Army basically just because he had no other choice, and then an increasingly unexpected series of circumstances and events take place that ultimately lead him to the most unexpected conclusion.
The film itself is structured in an interesting way, in that it is filmed and presented with such an emotionless detachment. As Ebert pointed out, there is a narrator that gives away any important events in advance to remove any sense of tension or suspense, and he narrates as though he were talking about field mice rather than real people. As such, the film is able to come across more as an exploration of Kubrick's ideas of human nature rather than another cloying period romance. Bravo! I have read (and am not surprised by) a lot of people saying that the movie is intolerably boring, which I must say is to be expected. Like so many Kubrick films, it is prohibitively long at just over three hours, and it is interesting in that it gives a feeling that nothing ever happens from beginning to end, and yet there is ALWAYS something happening.
Personally I absolutely loved it. It reminded me of another unique and enormously entertaining period film, Tom Jones, with it's brilliant comic performance by Albert Finney. Recenltly I have been going back and watching all of the Kubrick movies that I haven't seen as of yet, and even at it's prodigious length and slow pace (which is a Kubrick trademark if I've ever seen one), Barry Lyndon is still one of my favorites, at least of the overlooked classics. It is a bit of a commitment, but well worth it.