dubyah1 Pretension with a microbudget. Larry Miller says, 'art shouldn't wring its hands': I was so happy to have found this DVD after years of searching, but got weltschmerz instead of zeitgeist. Dreary, angsty, self-congratulating symbolism, and may I never see another antler, even an ironic pair. I'm a fan of Mark Rylance's stage and most of his film work, but this is a clinker. It reminds me of another wankerish flick, Guy Maddin's 'Tales from the Gimli Hospital': same crummy film stock, same low-budget pretension, same deep need for the directors to use their audience as therapists. 'Institute' appears to have been shot with a videocam & bargain-basement special effects doubtless by the director brothers; it has the makings of an OK 4-minute video, but the occasional beautiful shot of Mark Rylance's beautiful mouth can't make up for the wanna-be Bergman antics. Nine, circles, hell, we get it. Sheesh. you don't have to hit us over the head with the cloven hoof.Run, my friends, run far, far away. Rent 'Wild Strawberries' for the Bergman, 'Angels and Insects' for the Rylance, 'Excalibur' for the Orff, and 'Blood and Donuts' for the low-budget horror passion play that *works*: you'll thank me. Two stars for Mark Rylance's mouth's acting.

rtiplady Every now and again a film like Institute Benjamenta comes along which seems to have the sole purpose of testing the endurance of its audience to the limit. I saw it at the home of art-house cinema in the UK, the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, and was intrigued to notice that even here, where it could reasonably expect a sympathetic viewing, over half of the (small) audience decamped to the bar well before it ground to a close. I stuck it out to the end only because my companion seemed riveted, but it turned out she was hanging on grimly thinking I was similarly entranced! Mark Rylance (a wonderful actor) goes through the film with the expression of a mildly startled rabbit on his face, as if he couldn't quite believe what he had got himself into - neither could I.

galensaysyes If this has a meaning beyond the one on the surface, which carries no conviction, it must be one of the classic horror films. But I can't see that it does. The authoritarian, sexually perverse world that it depicts seems the creation of someone who has never experienced oppression or obsession at first hand and so has nothing to say about it. The film is a totally artificial and hermetic work. On the other hand, its distance from reality allows its manufacturers to take as much time as they please to refine and distill its essence, as in a bottle. But what is it they're distilling? Whatever it is, it gives off a lovely scent. One exquisite shot follows another; the actors are perfectly cast. Alice Krige I suppose can be called a cult figure (I'm one of the cult), and in this film she has finally found the ideal environment. It's never uninteresting, never unattractive--but it should have been disturbing and it isn't. Some day I hope to find something inside it.

Milo Jerome Institute Benjamenta is an oddity. Let me say that first, get it out of the way. Part of me hesitates from revealing here that it is one of my favourite films of all time because I know I'll make some people reading this mini-review approach it from the wrong angle. A film like this should never become required viewing. You should stumble across it at a repertory cinema somewhere or be beguiled by the video-box art showing the striking visage of Alice Krige as she paces before her blackboard, deerfoot staff in hand. You should find one evening that its the only thing that sounds interesting on TV, or peer at a still alongside a mention in your TV guide and wonder what on earth the picture is supposed to depict. Contained between main and end credits here is a world so visually ravishing and technically abstruse that you are only in the film while you are watching; the rules of the outside do not apply. You peer into the dreamy, foggy black-and-white and what you can't identify for certain your imagination fills out. These are the most special special effects because you wonder 'what' and 'why' by never 'how.' The Institute of the title is a school for servants, the lessons they are taught bizarre and repetitive to the point of making 'deja-vu' a permanent state of being. Is the repetition the point of it all or has the teacher lost the plot? If she has, how come we care? None of this is vaguely like real life. None of it, that is, bar the characters emotions. Or is the whole thing like real life, like Life with a capital 'L?' In the end does this sort of pondering make for a good movie? I won't answer that because I'm terribly biased. Remember the title and look it up sometime. It's the cinematic equivalent of a stunning old-fashioned magician's trick. A monochrome bouquet, a sad smile. There are images, scenes that may make the hairs on the back of your neck think they're a cornfield with a twister on the way. I tried to warn you as quietly as I could.