JULIEN DONKEY BOY - Harmony Korine

Dienstag 7.5.2013
20.30 Uhr
vorgestellt von Jan Krüger

USA 1999 | 94 Minuten | DV/35mm / 1:1.78 | Regie und Buch: Harmony Korine | Kamera: Anthony Dod Mantle | Montage: Valdis Oskarsdottir | Produktion: Cary Wood, Scott Macaulay, Robin O'Hara | Darsteller: Ewen Bremner, Chloe Sevigny, Werner Herzog, Evan Neumann u.a.


Julien Donkey-Boy is a 1999 American drama film written and directed by Harmony Korine. The story concentrates on the schizophrenic Julien, played by Scottish actor Ewen Bremner, and his dysfunctional family. The film also stars Chloë Sevigny as Julien's sister, Pearl, and Werner Herzog as his father. Julien Donkey-Boy is the sixth film to be made under the self-imposed rules of the Dogme 95 manifesto, and the first non-European film to be made under the Dogme 95 "vow of chastity".
(wikipedia)
 
As in the controversial Gummo (1997), Korine abandons traditional narrative for a series of vignettes about bizarre characters, in this case centered on Julien (Ewen Bremner), a schizophrenic who works in a school for the blind. Julien lives at home with his pregnant sister Pearl (Chloe Sevigny); his brother Chris (Evan Neumann), who wrestles in his spare time; and their violent father (Werner Herzog), who slaps his children around, hoses them down with water, and offers to pay Chris ten dollars to dress up in his late mother's clothes and dance. Eventually Julien escapes from his home and interacts with people on the street (some of whom, reportedly, were not professional actors and had no idea that Bremmer was an actor playing a scene). (...)
(rotten tomatoes)


Kritiken

The first American movie to comply with Dogme 95's lo-fi rules, this sophomore effort from Kids screenwriter Harmony Korine revolves around the grainy, improvised adventures of a singularly weird American family - which is saying something. Indeed, it's difficult to work out quite who is the flakiest - Bremner's shouty schizophrenic, Sevigny's empty-headed, harp-playing mother-to-be, or Herzog's apparently psychotic paterfamilias. Certainly, in real life, this misbegotten family would be worth an entire week of Jerry Springer shows. Despite some creditable performances, however, Korine's bizarre, shambling direction renders the result less ground-breakingly experimental than rectum-numbingly dull. Verdict: From his contribution to Kids, nobody was quite sure what to make of this-time director Korine. Now we know: pretencious. 
http://www.empireonline.com/reviews/ReviewComplete.asp?FID=6259


"A self-indulgent mess."
Edward Guthmann, San Francisco Chronicle 


"Julien donkey-boy acquires a spiritual dimension that allows it ultimately to become an act of redemption."
Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times


Trivia

The film's shooting script was a 124-scene treatment of sorts, essentially only offering descriptions of scenes ("The sound of hard wind," is all it says for Scene 8. In Scene 58, "julien's brother tries again in vain to kill the swan."). All the dialogue was improvised by the actors, with the exception of a telephone conversation between Julien and his sister. (...)

From 'Dogma95 confession' by Harmony Korine:

(…) If I was ever to make a Western, for instance, and a horse died because I asked too much from the stallion, I would not shed a tear simply because it died by my command. I would weep only if the horse died off camera. Cinema sustains life. It captures death in its progress. Thus the horse dies for the world as did Christ himself. With this belief, working and seriously believing as I do in the prophecy and intrinsic value of the "Vow Of Chastity," I welcome the conversion of belief and gladly altered my former approach. But this was not a solo conversion, but a happy one, and in this, I was born again.
(…)

http://www.harmony-korine.com/paper/index/i_julien.html