Land of the Blind

Plot synopsis:
Hollander plays Maximilian II (often called Junior), the ignorant, vindictive and petulant ruler of a troubled (but unnamed) country. Maximilian has two main interests: enjoying himself and running his country's movie industry. The output of the nation's film studios under Maximilian is limited to terrible action-adventure schlock with names like Out For Vengeance 4. While it is heavily implied that Junior is a childish sadist, it is conceded that his excesses are only bolstered by the encouragement of his beautiful, yet cruel, wife Josephine (Boyle) and the violence dealt by anti-government terrorists.
Ralph Fiennes plays Joe, a prison warder working at the prison where John Thorne is held at the beginning of the movie. During this early period, Thorne is a wreck, squatting in a shabby cell, enduring frequent beatings from the other guards and writing revolutionary slogans on the walls with his own feces. Joe comes to learn from Thorne and respect him for his bearing and intellect, if not his message. Maximilian, trying to quash spiraling dissent, takes the risk of letting Thorne out of jail, hoping to have him thus become not a great folk hero but another greedy, dishonest politician. Joe, too, is soon promoted to one of the guards at Maximilian's palace and a position in the country's elite military unit. After seeing Junior's madness first hand, it is he who betrays his master by letting Thorne and his followers into the palace's inner chambers while he and Josephine are engaged in a revolting sex game. Thorne shoots the pair, and becomes a ruler governing a country as absolutely totalitarian, if not more so, than the deceased Maximilian. Thorne also encourages separating children from their parents, bans action movies and eliminates imported medicine all while sending the country's professional classes to grim re-education camps. Frightened females cower underneath burqa-like garments.
For his assistance in assassinating the dictator, Joe is hailed as a hero by Thorne. Nevertheless, as Joe realizes that his one-time friend is just as bad as, if not worse than, his predecessor, he refuses to ally with the new regime. For this, Thorne sends Joe to a re-education camp.
Subjected to numerous cruel beatings and isolation techniques, Joe continually refuses to sign his loyalty oath. At one point Thorne visits but does not recognize his old friend, even after Joe attempts to show him repeatedly who he is. Joe is also accused of being a member of a "hidden" conspiracy within the prison itself. One of his former co-workers, assumedly after being severely beaten, admits to the conspiracy's veracity and accuses Joe of being involved. Joe is quickly brought to the dreaded Room 12. It is there that the audience is revealed to a shocking twist: Joe is accused of never helping Thorne conquer the government, or being a commando in a covert-ops group, but rather a standard recruit in the armed forces discharged after the standard two years. During this, Joe seems to hallucinate heavily, his interrogators becoming characters dead and alive we have seen throughout the film, and is asked once again what is better than a big juicy steak (a recurring question with a wordplay answer). Throughout the scene it is suggested he may be being tortured mentally or is undergoing a paranoid or psychotic episode. His answer to any of the questions asked is never shown.
We then cut to Thorne being killed in his bath by one of his once loyal followers. The revolutionary government is quickly overthrown. Junior's in-laws and nephew are revealed to have escaped during Thorne's revolution and, having lived in exile, have returned to re-establish the old government (with an outside country's assistance). The head of the camp returns to being a doctor and denies having taken part in the tortures and excesses he ordered, while the tortured co-worker that accused Joe of conspiracy is given a government job. This ex-coworker makes a number of empty promises to get Joe out of the camp as soon as the "political climate" settles, but says that his confession to helping murder Maximilian makes him a sensitive case. For having destroyed the old government, but also never having 'played ball' with the new one, Joe is stuck in limbo, in a prison cell until the end of time. 12 years later, we find Joe writing his memoirs in a white cell resembling that of a prison's or an asylum's, seemingly oblivious even to his daughter's visits. It is possible that he is insane, or that he is perfectly sane, but the woman that visited was an actor pretending to be his daughter to break him down. She leaves Joe writing his memoirs and exits his cell that is really located in some low end residential apartment complex implying that Joe is not a political prisoner but is under some sort of house arrest being taken care of by the State.

Tags: brainwashing, violence, avant garde, satire, murder

Review:
These despots show character traits mankind has witnessed in real life, such as Pol Pot, Mussolini, Louis XVI/Marie Antoinette, Peron, Ayatollah Khoumeni, and Kim Jong Il. In this "land of the blind," the people are more interested in popular culture than the suffering of mankind at the hands of the despots.
As a result, they elect movie stars to represent them in what becomes clear as a sham system.Those people who are politically motivated and want to see a parallel between the nasty people who are leading the poor nation in the story to ruin and the current world leaders are, in my opinion, completely missing the point.
New governments can provide their side of the story--the elephant--to the blind public by steering them to the desired part of the anatomy.Donald Sutherland, playing a character aptly named Thorn, is one of the best casting choices ever made.
Think of it sort of like V for Vendetta, except the overthrower is Donald Sutherland, and without all the cool lines, big ka-booms and ninja fight scenes.Joe (Ralph Fiennes) is a soldier in a prison holding famed terrorist/politician Thorne (Donald Sutherland).
Donald Sutherland is perfectly cast as Thorne, making him just as intriguing as Joe. His performance is thought generating, powerful, and memorable.
His sets are interesting and realistic, and the music is somewhat noticeable in a good way.Land of the Blind is the second best political thriller of the year, behind the wonderful V for Vendetta.
It is a rare event when a feature film with two name stars, Fiennes and Sutherland in this case, can so eloquently capture the political atmosphere wafting across the world today.
Robert Edward's 'Land of The Blind' does this and much more in the political thriller/drama/ comedy that manages to create an original film based on themes that have unfortunately not gone out of style.
'Land of The Blind' has the guts to take the viewer on a journey that few filmmakers would dare these days, and having the acting to back it up takes the film straight to the winners circle.
Make room George Clooney, thank goodness another talented filmmaker has emerged with courage and vision.On a side note, I had the good opportunity to see this film in London at the Human Rights Watch Festival, and the sold out crowd went absolutely nuts for the picture.
However, the hope for freedom and a better world doesn't last long...In the official program of the Film Festival in Munich, LAND OF THE BLIND was announced as "a satiric political drama about terrorism, revolution, and the power of memory".
Together with the satiric elements, this aspect makes the film more entertaining and less pretentious.The film is promoted by "Human Rights Watch", although Robert Edwards' intention was certainly not a clamant "call to arms", but rather a quiet sigh about the state of the world..
Politicians are voted in based on their acting credentials; the President-for-Life is also a self-styled auteur of 'B' action movies; the sycophantic TV news-anchors remain upbeat and bubbly as they bend to the political winds, switching cheerily from Brooks Brothers to burqas.At the heart of the movie is the relationship between imprisoned playwright Thorne (Donald Sutherland) and the man who guards him - Joe (Ralph Feinnes.) Thorne is a tortured man in possession of a brilliant mind, who's been reduced to writing on the walls of his cell with his own excrement.Joe works for Junior, the buffoonish but cunning dictator played brilliantly by Tom Hollander.
Some will see parallels between him and other political leaders - the wealthy, goofy President trying to live up to the image of his father, the manipulation of a nation's fear of terrorism to hide gross abuses of power, etc.Joe is cursed with a moral compass.
But the question of whether Thorne is a Vaclav Havel - an intellectual who could save his country, or an Abimael Guzman  the imprisoned Peruvian professor and leader of the Shining Path terrorists, is grimly answered in the movie's closing act.The cast is remarkable, nothing you wouldn't expect from Fiennes and Sutherland, and Lara Flyn Boyle does a terrifically dark and funny Lady Macbeth as Junior's wife.
Also, like those films, LOTB is darkly cynical and very, very funny.It's a rare pleasure to see this kind of razor-sharp satire wrapped in a thrilling, artful, and well-crafted piece of story telling..
Land of the Blind is a fearless meditation on the corrupting nature of power, and adds to the current, very welcome, crop of thought provoking political films.
We ride on the shoulder of an idealistic prison guard as he chooses sides, and faces the consequences of that choice.As the movie was building, I felt like it was building a Pro-Terrorism Utopian government, but in the end I was left hopeless, because of each plot turn making the movie yet more dour.Symbolism abounds, and you will find yourself trying to locate the meanings of the symbols, which are perhaps a tad too convoluted for my tastes.I was completely immersed in the story, and I found the progression of the movie to be very compelling, but the overall message of hopelessness clashed with my youthful idealism.I recommend this movie as debate fodder for political theorists.
it's not great, but it does do a good job at exposing the hypocrisy of power, and who is better suited to govern, a single person/regime or that amorphous element named "The People".Donald Sutherland and Rafe(don't call me Ralph!) Fiennes, give wonderful acting performances, and there are many great supporting roles too.
Woo Hoo!).There is a lot of interesting and intelligent dialog through out the film too , the director/writer is obviously a literate man.My problem, is that this film tries to hard to be too many things at once.BTW, the poem that Sutherland's and Fiennes' characters quote is by William Butler Yeats and it's named "The Second Coming", and the haunting piano music you hear, you might remember is also used in "Barry Lyndon" and I believe is written by MozartIt's definitely worth a rental though..
The filmmakers are careful not to criticise any kinds of regime, in order to avoid a political war.The two leading actors, Ralph Fiennes and Donald Sutherland both give strong performances in the film.
Perhaps if you grew up as a mushroom you might be shocked enough by the content of this film to think it is actually worth something.It takes elements of King Charles I, Cromwell, the Restoration, Soviet Russia, the novel 1984 and various other things, mixes them together and makes a pointless story pretending to be something more.It starts off OK but soon it becomes clear the writer has no real ideas of his own and is just loosely copying history.Apart from Ralph Fiennes putting in a fine performance and some nice shots of the former Royal residence Brighton Pavilion, I was bored and felt I had lost 2 hours of my life.The ending was the biggest disappointment as it really questions why I bothered to get that far..
Tom Hollander, who previously played Kim Philby in "Cambridge Spies" was superb in the role of Maximilian.My only gripe is that I had the impression that this would have been a good film if I had been able to hear it rather than just watch.
It becomes sadly obvious that Joe and Donald Sutherland are the only characters in the film's world with any semblance of intelligence or free will; everyone else is mere blind sheep, ciphers, straw men.
The Land of The Blind is a satirical place, and its inhabitants aren't to be taken as anything more than straw men, but by the second half the pathos and music montages and fancy CG cuts are sprinkled a little too graciously to spice the film up, and the viewer's patience and involvement with any sort of parallel reality wears too thin.I enjoyed the settings, and how they were filmed.
Reading Huxley's "Brave New World", Orwell's "1984", or watching Terry Gilliam's "Brazil", or even a movie like "Matrix" moved me and gave me similar thrill, and left me thinking about that stuff and other things some while - just to give hint about this film, but not to compare with..
A Hodgepodge Movie Trying to Figure Out What It Wants to Be. LAND OF THE BLIND is a strange horse of a film.
It is so full of gimmicks, silly scenes, awkward dialogue, and mixed metaphors that it sinks under its own intended farcical weight.Robert Edwards wrote and directed this take off on totalitarian governments and the crises that arise with the corruption of power, sprayed it globally and historically so that it can include everyone in its aim, and shot it in a Felliniesque fashion that just falls short of significance.
Abetted with a strong cast of actors (Ralph Fiennes, Donald Sutherland, Tom Hollander, Lara Flynn Boyle, etc) one would think this overproduced piece would have made it.
If you think the villains in LOTB are exaggerated, wait till you learn the real deeds of Chairman Mao, Kim Jong-il, Fidel Castro, Khomeini, Joseph Stalin Yes, the characters are simplified & the story is abstract, but how much can one fit in 1 hour of what he sees of the world political history + current conflicts?
So, hey Midwesterner, yes it might be a critique on your country but it's a burger-and-coke-ignoring piece of pretentious crap, so feel free to diss this film.And yes, while some some themes are not new (power corrupts, extreme left is as wrong as extreme right), this is something that is especially relevant today when the worlds strongest power is sliding down the slippery slope towards some sort of theocracy.Lots of critics seem to enjoy making fun of Joe, by wondering why he's willing to endure the torture?!!
The title of the Film being so appropriate to the lives and societies we live in today referencing how clueless most people are when it comes to Government Bodies and Regulations that dictate both Internal and Foreign Policy.Land of the Blind is an exceptionally good account of how a society formed by anarchy and terrorism could exist.
Ralph Fiennes is a brave an excellent actor who I've seen astound me on stage on many occasions (let alone his excellent film-work) and he doesn't disappoint at all in this hugely powerful role.
Late in the film, a doctor tells a story of a group of blind men who each feel a different part of an elephant and give their opinions on what an elephant is: "One felt the trunk and said, 'an elephant is very much like a snake'.
To say that it is biased is to be ignorant of much of the film; this film has no stated political sides; it points fingers at the fascist dictator just as easily as it points fingers at the violent rebels trying to give power back to the people.
This group, known as the Citizens for Justice and Democracy, claims noted playwright John Thorne as a member.Embodied by Donald Sutherland, Thorne is one of the most interesting characters I've ever seen in a film.
He takes in the deaths with an air of amused shock, but when he hears of how Thorne's popularity is growing, he turns pale with fury and takes it out on his aides with a sadistic ease.The film deals with Joe's change in mind set, from the neutral observer just doing his job, to becoming attached to Thorne's plight, and then watching as the two sides vying for power reveal their darkest actions.
It is clear that Maximilian is a corrupt man who would rather spend his time making bad films rather than rule the country properly, and Joe finds himself pulled to Thorne's side as Thorne is slowly granted new prisoner rights in the face of a humiliation for the government in power.
Joing Donald Sutherland, a revolutionary leader, to depose the dictator, he soon finds that things are worse than ever as an islamo-fascist state is now in power and he is cast in prison because he will not sign a loyalty oath.
Ralph Fiennes and Donald Sutherland, why did you make this film ?
Land of the Blind is a political satire about the elite of power and the elite of revolution for the people and the ultimate dictatorial result no matter who is in power.
Modern political environments echo the theme of this film  absolute power corrupts absolutely.
While uniquely entertaining for the cynic in us all, Land of the Blind suffers from over-indulgences, simply when it comes to the stylizing of them regarding the supremely corrupted, tyrannical, fictitious government; in turn softening the impact of it's relevance, which ends up making this film worth seeing...but not staring..
Robert Edwards' 2006 film The Land of the Blind is ultimately a tale of how absolute power corrupts, absolutely.
I got the feeling this was, indeed, one man's view on how the hypothesis of complete control completely corrupts and destroys an individual from within and those they might watch over; unlike Donald Sutherland's character very early on in the film, we do not necessarily have a complete turd on our hands here.
While the film just about pulls off what it sets out to achieve, it's at a wavering and frustrating cost.The film provides us with the character of Joe, played by Ralph Fiennes; initially a security guard at a high security prison in a nation run by a remorseless; disgraceful; gross and political correctness disregarding dictator named Maximilian II (Hollander), a man who has inherited the kingdom from his father and continues the brutal ruling of it.
Hollander does a good job in playing this small, wormy, measly little man whom just happens to have landed the most powerful job in the world.
The third member of the triple threat the film revolves around is the prisoner Joe is charged with observing, a certain free thinking elderly man of a supposed politically driven opposite to that of Maximillian II, named Thorne and played by the aforementioned Sutherland.
In thinking he was initially lending a helping hand for the opposition, despite things looking good for him, things were never quite as rosy as they seemed.Edwards' idea that the state within his film could be representative of any nation throughout history, corrupt or otherwise, is impressively established with a glut of varying mise-en-scene, further still aiding in the disorientating feel the film has.
I like to think of this as the point rather than character inconsistencies within Thorne; that with the obtaining of so much power after so much graft, no matter how well meaning the individual came across as in times of great strain, the being granted of so much power will usually have a detrimental effect on the individual.After suffering a great deal in a world that sees the shallow and narrow minded rewarded, with the creative and academics punished, we feel Thorne's attitudes were merely the lesser of two evils on the whole; particularly evident when the hate supposedly transfered onto the victims of the state come back to haunt them when the uprising sees a ridiculously unfair trial of the former leader, which features the gagging of one person on trial and the sole witness being the one who's in the process of electing themselves the new leader.
The film's colourful look and somewhat comedic overall tone stands in deliberately stark contrast to what's playing out, a tale of absolute power absolutely corrupting; two different plights: in the character of Joe, one of morality which later manifests as one spawned by suppression suffering by the state with Thorne's mirroring this in that it takes a similar structure but the other way around.
And make no mistake, the movie takes place in today's world, based on most references throughout the film -- so, elements just don't fit.
That's right; I could actually feel myself getting stupider for having to watch this film just to make sure that there were, in fact, no good parts to it.
What are Fiennes and Sutherland doing in this film?Robert Edwards may be a more intellectual type than Uwe Boll but his directing and writing skills are of no higher standard.Please Edwards, do better next time or make use of other mediums for your idea's.
I enjoyed the film, I think Blake Edwards did a great job for his first political screenplay thriller..
Land of the Blind thinks it is a witty, modern satire on power and corruption.
We are given no real reason to believe why: a) Fiennes rises from prison guard to captain of a secret military platoon that hunts terrorists and guards the president and b) then sides with Sutherland.Rather than be corrupted by power as he acquires it, Sutherland's character turns out to be just another dictator in waiting and after all his philosophizing and poetry-quoting in jail the first thing he does is end free speech and murder the previous ruler.
The film gets so basic that we even get to watch the tyrant taking a crap.The only thing that saved me from squeezing out my own eyeballs was Fiennes' performance.
Really a most thought-provoking dystopia film with a bizarre ending that like most great movies - leaving you wondering...It drags a bit and is quite silly in the first half hour, but then it picks up, adding elements, symbolism, styles and phrases of dystopian regimes throughout the past 2-300 years.
I found that watching this film was a bit like listening to American Pie back in the day, trying to figure out the reference point for each line.
References abound, but I felt as if it were almost more of a parlor game for the makers of the film than a serious querying of human responsibility or a wise, satirical look at power and politics.
Told in flashback, it begins with Joe as a prison guard watching over a playwright turned terrorist name Thorne (Donald Sutherland).