351 The Spirit of the Beehive

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Steven H · #151 Post by **Steven H** » Sun Oct 01, 2006 10:09 am

I haven't really seen it brought up, but did anyone else get an eerie connection between Isabel strangling the cat, faking at doing the same to Ana, and the Karloff vision at the end? Was Isabel inspired by Whale's Frankenstein? It reminds me of how an act of violence seen by a child can really take hold in their memory, as if both Isabel and Ana were affected in different ways by that specific moment in Frankenstein, one to act it out, the other to fear it. I can imagine Erice thinking a connection like this is important, though I seriously doubt any liberal censorship ideas were behind it. Relative to the film, the emphasis on this is almost spelled out.

Not that I go around burying bunny rabbits, but I had a similar experience with Watership Down, seeing it as a kid, the part where the burrow is filled in with dirt. It was burned into my brain, though I probably had the "Ana" reaction. I'm sure everyone who posts here has had a similar experience with a film when they were younger.

HerrSchreck · #152 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Sun Oct 01, 2006 10:26 am

The way I saw the film Isabel was like that before she saw FRANK. I saw the seeing how long she could hold the cat in place by the neck & flirting with the idea of seriusly damaging the cat as the same powertripping-experimentation with dominance that she was doing with Isabel, and totally unconnected to her watching the movie. So many kids do stuff like that as they get older. Its like she went out with a magnifying glass and starting burning ants in the sun.

Schkura · #153 Post by **Schkura** » Sun Oct 01, 2006 1:44 pm

Wittsdream · #154 Post by **Wittsdream** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 5:19 pm

Not certain if this has been posted, but I discovered an article at Rouge that might be of interest to fans of both Erice and Kiarostami. The article draws many parallels between both filmmakers, and devotes quite a bit of time to Spirit of the Beehive. I found it quite tangential to statements some posters have made in this particular thread.

ellipsis7 · #155 Post by **ellipsis7** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 5:44 pm

Interesting - have just ordered English language edition of the Erice-Kiarostami correspondence from alapage.com...

colinr0380 · #156 Post by **colinr0380** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 5:26 am

A review of the DVD from the Horrordvds.com

John Cope · #157 Post by **John Cope** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 7:51 pm

ellipsis7 wrote:Interesting - have just ordered English language edition of the Erice-Kiarostami correspondence from alapage.com...

I was unaware that this even existed. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. Let us know how it is when you receive it.

kevyip1 · #158 Post by **kevyip1** » Thu Oct 19, 2006 1:39 pm

Spoiler-filled comments ahead, to those who haven't seen the film:

SpoilerShow

The "problem" of this film for me is this. The version of "Frankenstein" that Ana saw was obviously the censored version, where the little girl's death was cut out. So if Ana hadn't seen the censored version (I believe only American prints were censored(?) ), she would've been less mystified about the death, and her intense fascination with the Frankenstein monster would probably not have been triggered, or at least not to such great extent. Since the unexplained death is what drives "Spirit of the Beehive", its impact is lessened when seen today, when we've all seen the censored scene and know how the little girl died. It is like if Jack the Ripper's identity were known to us, we would not enjoy all those JTR movies as much.

miless · #159 Post by **miless** » Thu Oct 19, 2006 1:45 pm

we don't see that section of the film... we see the before, and the after... What I believe is that she can't see why he killed her... it's more of that Ana, a child, did not understand what she saw (at least that's what I thought)... The film could very well have been censored in Spain though (the Franco regime was notorious for censoring and repression).

kevyip1 · #160 Post by **kevyip1** » Thu Oct 19, 2006 6:09 pm

HerrSchreck wrote:Though I do agree with the writer (in the doc) that the spell is broken by Erice's choosing to shoot the Karloff-imitation straight on, rather than be a little subtler in the chosen angles.

I was also taken aback by the decidedly unmagical display of the Frankenstein monster, which was so out of character with the rest of the film. I was hoping maybe there would be a "payoff", a good reason for taking all that trouble. Maybe something shocking and unexpected, such as the monster throwing Ana into the water(!), thus reenacting a moment that was heretofore unseen...

GringoTex · #161 Post by **GringoTex** » Thu Oct 19, 2006 9:46 pm

I was finally able to watch the film the whole way through. The first two times I tried to watch it, I was so taken with grief at Isabel's death that I couldn't finish it.

Now that I finished it, I'm amazed that no critic (please correct me if I'm wrong) has come to the conclusion that Isabel really did die. While Ana sees her after the "death," it's in my mind obviously a dream state. Every appearance of Anna after her tumble from the chair is a subjective one. The one long shot of her and Ana's room reveals a bedspring with a missing mattress.

It's also a very Latin American film, in my eyes. Particularly the acceptance with which childhood accepts its parenting. My own children are Salvadorean, and the care with which Erice reveals the horror of Franco reminds me of the care with which I approach my own children's turbulent history. AKA: I hope it doesn't kill them.

Michael · #162 Post by **Michael** » Sat Oct 21, 2006 10:06 am

Isabel really dead? Never thought of that. The missing mattress in the girls' bedroom was kinda strange but I always thought that Isabel was removed from the bedroom so that Ana could recover without interruptions, etc.

denti alligator · #163 Post by **denti alligator** » Mon Oct 23, 2006 12:36 am

Beautiful transfer, but this can't be 1:66, can it? Looks less wide, closer to 1:55:1. Can someone confirm this so that I know my TV settings aren't totally off.

HerrSchreck · #164 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Mon Oct 23, 2006 1:04 am

I really don't think the mass of critical opinion/discussion on this film concludes that Isabel is dead. Not that with a film like this youre not allowed to conclude whatever the hell you want to, which is half the joy & beauty of the thing... but I really don't think the vast majority of assessments of the film see Isabel as doing anything put discovering the power to Fuck With People, and screwing with Ana's mind by playing dead.

The Fanciful Norwegian · #165 Post by **The Fanciful Norwegian** » Mon Oct 23, 2006 1:09 am

denti alligator wrote:Beautiful transfer, but this can't be 1:66, can it? Looks less wide, closer to 1:55:1. Can someone confirm this so that I know my TV settings aren't totally off.

The caps at DVD Beaver are 1.66:1, so unless they were resized it's safe to assume that's the real AR.

HerrSchreck · #166 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Mon Oct 23, 2006 1:21 am

I'd even say, looking at the caps vs the Optimum, that the CC is wider, as there is more info on the sides, therefore closer to the Great Unknown.. i e the notorious pain inna ass 1.66 to 1 OAR.

denti alligator · #167 Post by **denti alligator** » Mon Oct 23, 2006 11:40 am

I'll have to do an actual measurement, because my TV is an unusual 15x9 (that is 1.66:1), and this film had black bars on the left and right, which I never see in a 1.66 film. They were very thin bars, but there nonetheless.

Tommaso · #168 Post by **Tommaso** » Sun Oct 29, 2006 6:30 am

Can anybody explain why I never get these black bars on the side of my 16:9 Philips screen when I watch an anamorphic 1.66 film? My player's settings are correct, for sure. Instead the image seems to be slightly cropped at the top and very much so on the bottom to fill the whole screen. The only workaround of course is to put the player to 4:3 output and then zoom in, but it of course results in a much weaker image. The re-framing really disturbed me with "Beehive", especially when comparing the main movie's scenes with some of the frames used in the 4:3 encoded documentaries on the second disc, which looked much better framing-wise. It's not very disturbing usually, but in the case of this film, which is so gorgeously composed, it really let me down...

As to Erice himself: is there any explanation of his long silence as a film-maker since "Dream of Light"? Of course he says in that Japanese interview that times have changed and that most contemporary films trying to depict contemporary reality take on the same 'blurred', opaque quality as the time itself does, and that he does not want this. But never having seen Erice, the man before, I was really surprised about his vitality and youthfulness, and not being the old, meditating recluse I had expected after seeing "Dream of Light" (which is SUCH a great film, btw). Still, both films (I haven't seen "El Sur") exude a longing for a lost time, a certain slow-going and all the more fascinating nostalg(h)ia that has become very rare indeed. Looking for comparisons when re-watching the unique "Beehive", only Tarkovsky and Angelopoulos came to my mind...

#169 Post by **zedz** » Sun Oct 29, 2006 6:40 pm

Tommaso wrote: As to Erice himself: is there any explanation of his long silence as a film-maker since "Dream of Light"?

He has made two (short) films in the last few years, one of which (Lifelines) is yet another masterpiece - and I haven't seen the Kiarostami piece. That last ten-year silence is thus not really more extended than the ones between Beehive and El Sur and El Sur and Quince Tree Sun.

It's nevertheless extremely frustrating, especially as it seems that, as was the case with other low-output masters like Dreyer and Tarkovsky, it's probably because his films are ten-years-in-the-financing rather than ten-years-in-the-making. We can probably safely add Terence Davies to this particular Cinema Hall of Shame.

ellipsis7 · #170 Post by **ellipsis7** » Mon Nov 13, 2006 6:18 am

I eventually got the ERICE-KIAROSTAMI CORRESPONDENCES English edition from the UK Book Depository here

It's a beautifully put together book, including the 4 letters between Erice and Kiarostami (and paralleling their 'Twofold Childhood of Cinema' from their births in 1940 ten days apart), a series of original essays including ones by Alberto Elena, Alain Bergala and Dominique Paini, plus a multitude of incredibly well reproduced colour & B/w photographs from each filmmakers' work, in cinema, installation and stills... I haven't had a chance other than to flick through the writings, but they look equally stimulating... The book was created as a catalogue to an exhibition but is so much more than that... A real delight...

Review of Erice-Kiarostami Correspondences by Linda C. Ehrlich on Senses of Cinema here

garmonbozia · #171 Post by **garmonbozia** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 6:54 pm

This dvd is one of the nominees for this year's Rondo Awards if anyone is interesting in voting. Voting is done via email. The ballot and instructions can be found here.

garmonbozia wrote:This dvd is one of the nominees for this year's Rondo Awards if anyone is interesting in voting. Voting is done via email. The ballot and instructions can be found here.

pauling · #173 Post by **pauling** » Mon Feb 12, 2007 1:07 pm

I think that since the film can work on many different levels that the title can be seen to have myriad meanings as well. Literally, it could be the work that Fernando does with his bees. However, I think Erice is making a connection with Spain and more specifically with Spaniards living under Franco. I've always seen the "spirit" of the title to mean imagination and the "beehive" to be a repressed society in the sense that art could liberate a populace. I'm sure childhood innocence could be included in there as well. Really, any analysis doesn't do justice to this film. Pure filmic poetry.

leo goldsmith · #174 Post by **leo goldsmith** » Mon Feb 12, 2007 5:03 pm

Interpretation aside, if you're asking what it literally means, then it refers to the "spirit" that lives near the father's beehive. In other words, Frankenstein's monster, as Isabel explains him to Ana.

Panda · #175 Post by **Panda** » Mon Feb 12, 2007 8:20 pm

I have a slightly different interpretation of the title.

Because of the amount of attention to the interior glass beehive as well as Fernando's notes regarding the erratic and purposeless behavior of the bees within it, I believe the spirit is Franco. After all, bees are among the most socially organized insects (when left to themselves) and parallels are drawn between them and the emotionally arrested, stunted behavior of the town's citizens living as they are under the shadow of fascism.

As for Ana's "monster", I believe him to be liberator from the imagination and a means to achieve personal empowerment.

This is indeed a gorgeous film and endlessly satisfying through multiple viewings.

Panda