Review of Pandora's Box (2009) by Simona B — 02 Nov 2010

Pandora's Box is a difficult movie to love: it does not have a single likeable character. Plenty of interesting ones - yes - all of whom are strange, insecure, passive-aggressive sex/love (this film sort of blurs the boundaries there...)-crazed twits or crooks or something in between. There's Lulu (Louise Brooks), a femme fatale-in-training afflicted with a remarkable degree of irresponsibility and naiveté, her sugar daddy Dr. Schon, who never leaves the house without taking his unresolved sexual repressions with him, Dr. Schon's gutless son-sans-a-backbone, a closeted Countess, Lulu's alcoholic father who believes his daughter's status as a kept woman is an achievement, and a host of rancid criminals who, not standing a chance for Lulu's affections, come to treat her as merchandise.

The main character, of course, is passion. Everybody in this film wants to shag Lulu, except for the aforementioned criminals and Lulu's father, who want to sell her to those who want to shag her. The tide of desire sweeps her up; she is too vain to resist it yet too weak to turn it to her advantage; it all ends badly for nearly everyone involved.

Cinematography is good, though not groundbreaking, Brooks's acting passes the mark, and I quite liked the sets: minimalist visually, designed to spec for black and white photography, functional, unobtrusive. However, the highest score (no pun intended), goes to the music. The screening at BFI Southbank was accompanied by live piano, which was, simply put, brilliant. Neil Brand's music was what made Pandora's Box a great cinema experience; it rose and fell to amplify rather than anticipate emotion; I wish modern filmmaking took a note of this.