Ignoring his wife’s pleading, a stalker (a guide) takes both a writer looking for inspiration and a scientist looking to win a Nobel prize, on an expedition into a prohibited area known as The Zone to locate a room where all wishes are granted. The stalker seems to posses mysterious powers that alert only him to danger and show him the way to the room.
The story is a little reminiscent of The Wizard of Oz, well maybe after the writer has taken some LSD: a small group making their way across a strange land, each with their own wishes that they hope will be granted when they get to the destination. Along the way they will meet challenges and dangers and, of course, everything is not as it first seems.
This film by Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky is loosely based on the book Roadside Picnic with its screenplay written by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky. It is art-house in style and may not appeal to many, other than the most ardent Cinefiles. Scenes outside of the Zone are in sepia whilst scenes within the Zone are full colour.
The film is made up of a number of long and slow shots, where the camera pans around giving the audience a constant view of the scenery and creating an eerie suspense. It’s deliberately and disturbingly slow. In the second half there is a scene where a character oddly speaks directly to the camera and then the film ends unexpectedly and abruptly. The result is a film that looks and feels like something between art-house and science fiction.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this particular screening is the live music accompanying the film. Performed by Lisa Gerrard, Brian Ritchie and Gabriella Smart, the music is completely improvised and this works amazingly well, it never dominates or distracts from the film but adds to the intensity and atmosphere.
Stalker, starring Alisa Freyndikh, Aleksandr Kaydanovskiy, Anatoliy Solonitsyn and Nikolay Grinko, is one of the more interesting selections in the Adelaide Film Festival 2015 line up. Over the years this film has received great reviews and ranks number 29 on the British Film Institute’s ‘50 Greatest Films of All Time’ poll. Being art-house and with a running time of 163 minutes however, it will definitely not appeal to everyone’s taste.
Reviewed by Ceri Horner
Twitter: @CeriHorner
Rating out of 10: 8
Stalker screened as part of the Adelaide Film Festival, running 15-25 October 2015.
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