Western frontiers of the USSR, 1942. The region is under German occupation. A man is wrongly accused of collaboration. Desperate to save his dignity, he faces impossible moral choice.
A stately, austere and richly atmospheric war film from director Sergei Loznitsa.
In The Fog is a haunting depiction of the hidden tragedies of war.
The Dirty Dozen it isn't but in its meditative way, this is moving and meticulously crafted film-making.
This is a masterpiece of serious cinema; long, slow and grave as the grave. You won’t believe me but I came out beaming.
As challenging as it is rewarding.
Heavy-handed metaphors hang in the thick fog.
Shot in long, measured takes and claustrophobic widescreen by Romanian cameraman Oleg Mutu, this is an imposingly sombre piece, but also a compelling, nerve-racking narrative – and one of the year's unmissables.
In the Fog is a deeply serious, utterly humourless story of social and spiritual conflict of the kind we encounter in the fictions of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, and we are drawn into a moral debate as we accompany Sushenya, Voitik and Burov on their danger-fraught odyssey. The conclusion is highly ironic, realistic rather than cruelly cynical, and immersed in a rolling bank of fog.
Well worth sticking with for its staggering payoff.
General release. Check local listings for show times.
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