Review of Ecstasy of the Angels (1972) by Aaron W — 03 Sep 2008

I'd be lying if I said I had any idea what the hell was going on in this film. From what I gathered there's this rebel terrorist group called The Four Seasons which is run by The Year and is made up of four smaller groups called Fall, Winter, Spring and Summer which are in turn separated into smaller groups named after the months. Well, October group is sent by Fall to steal some weapons from the U.S. Army. Something goes wrong and most of the group is killed while its leader, also named October, is blinded by a grenade. I guess it turns out they were betrayed by Fall who's trying to....well I don't really know what she's trying to do...I kind of got lost after that. Anyway, October decides to break away and form his own rebel group of about four people and they end up just running around town throwing bombs willy nilly.

So, I've got no clue what these people are rebelling against. Obviously it's the government, but they never really talk about why, and all of their targets seem to be picked at random. Maybe that's the point, I don't know.

Anyway, like most Wakamatsu films, this one is gorgeously shot and hard to look away from. There are some really beautiful scenes and once again this all sort of makes of for the lack of a sensical plot. Its also got a great jazzy soundtrack.