The Wall of Monsiuer Hire

Rating: 10/10 (15 February 2007)

The performances in this film are perfectly tuned. The set design is incredible, the cinematography stunning, the lighting as it should be, the script fine, the music perfectly chosen, and the morality of the tale unquestionable. The first half hour of the film seemed a little over the top (unintended word play, think The Wall), mainly due to the monotonal quality of Ulrich Muhe's character, but that performance is reasonable in the context of the whole. The secondary slow development problem is related to the historicity of the piece, which gets a little newsreely in tone early on. BUT, and that is a big but, the film as a whole works superbly. The M. Hire in the headline summary is because of the similarity of character, in major part, to that of Michel Blanc in the brilliant French film of that title based on a Simenon novel. It, too is about deception and betrayal and integrity. Sebastian Koch who gives a very fine performance, bears an uncanny resemblance to the late Canadian American television journalist, Peter Jennings, and his style reminded me of a Scandinavian actor in a rather cultish philosophical group whose name eludes me, in particular a film about a rich man's retirement party he gives in praise of himself. It could be purely physiognomy (the son of the retiring monster) but it did occur to me while watching. Touching for the pure human aspect of the film, the heroic humanity of some characters, the subtle and visible transformation of the true believer (Muhe), the cumulative power of all of the aspects of the film is very strong. If there is any better framed and art designed film in the past year I did not see it.