Intellectually Stimulating Zweig Cinema Magic

Rating: 10/10 (4 August 2014)

A visionary director of obvious intelligence has taken a screenplay of gold in hand and created a stunning, literate, lovely motion picture for those of us who seek the intellectually stimulating in cinema choices. When it was announced that the wonderful author Stefan Zweig was the inspiration for this film, we were incredulous but tantalized. Upon experiencing this beautiful motion picture, we were speechless. It was thrilling to see Zweig's spirit embraced, alive on the screen and permeating celluloid. Superbly directed by Anderson with characters brought to life by a cast of great actors, especially Ralph Fiennes and F. Murray Abraham ( a delight to see Abraham indeed!), the proceedings are amazingly Stefan Zweig cinematically realized at times. The wit, the quirkiness, the satire is all there, yet the dark cloud of future totalitarianism casts a shadow across laughing faces as a portent of things to come. The tragic cataclysm of fascism in 1930's Europe is seldom far from our thoughts as we watch the incredibly photographed, fairytale landscapes before us. This is simply a wondrously made movie, set in a mythical country that is virtually Oz-like in appearance. The humor is broad and almost slapstick in sequences but there is something much darker beneath all of it and a certain overall uneasiness experienced by audiences. Without doubt one of the very, very few films of the last decade that truly deserves our unreserved acclaim. It is certainly director Anderson's most accomplished and meaningful work and our admiration for him is now quite intense, to be sure. He has honored Stefan Zweig most appropriately and deliciously, surely inspiring a renewed appreciation and even rediscovery of Zweig and that is the real triumph of this quite intellectual piece of cinema magic.