Published via Ecency

(source: tmdb.org)

For a brief moment, it looked like the only true winner of Cold War was Europe. Continent, liberated from ideological divisions and threat of nuclear annihilation, was about to become united and present its pacifism, welfare state and culture as the alternative to brash materialism and gung ho militarism of United States. This optimistic sentiments reflected on film makers. One of those was Hungarian director Istvan Szabo whose 1991 drama Meeting Venus is both celebration and mild criticism of new realities.

Protagonist, played by Niels Arestrup, is Zoltan Szanto, Hungarian music conductor who comes from Budapest to Paris to work on ambitious staging of Richard Wagner’s opera Tannhäuser. The performance, which is going to be televised to 27 countries, is about to take place in Opera Europa, one of the most prestigious opera houses on the continent. Szanto, who considers himself relatively unknown musician from former East Bloc country, sees Tannhäuser an opportunity to make himself into an international star. He is at first delighted to see diverse multi-national cast and orchestra that includes even some of people from his past. But his enthusiasm is soon challenged when he is forced to deal with inflated egos of everyone involved, orchestra and theatre staff bound by incomprehensible labour union rules, incompetent management and protests and terrorist threats against corporate sponsor accused of endangering environment. One of the few people that doesn’t appear to cause any problems for Szanto is Karin Anderson (played by Glenn Close), soprano singer that plays the role of Elisabeth. Two of them start practising together and Szanto, despite having wife and child in Hungary, begins passionate love affair with her.

Istvan Szabo became world famous in 1980s for the series of films that dealt with troubled 20th Century history of Europe, a period marked by forces of nationalism and socialism brought to its extremes. In Meeting Venus Szabo deals with the present, which is definitely more relaxed, with former national and ideological boundaries becoming so insignificant that a descendant of White Russian emigrees can indulge in singing favourite song of Soviet dictator Stalin and civil wars, bombings and persecutions becoming subject of nostalgic jokes. However, the new reality, based on the triumph of global capitalism, can’t solve the more basic human problems, so the people and institutions are as dysfunctional as they were at before the collapse of Berlin Wall. The protagonist, wonderfully played by renowned Franco-Danish actor Niels Arestrup, has to deal with peoples’ envy, greed, lust and drug habits, while the bureaucracy, whether in form of airport security controls or labour unions is still as nightmarish as it was in Soviet Bloc. This is often the source of humour, which makes Meeting Venus closer to comedy than to drama. Szabo underlines this effect even with some casting choices – role of Tannhäuser in the production is played by two singers, which are in the film played with two actors with distinctively different physical appearances – tall American Jay O. Saunders and short Slovak Marián Labuda. This is used in the film with humorous effect.

Szabo and his co-writer Michael Hirst (best known as author of later television hits like The Tudors and Vikings) are, however, less successful when they try to put their observations about post-Cold War Europe into something of a coherent plot. An attempt to make protagonist’s romantic dilemma resembling the same dilemma by protagonist of Wagner’s opera doesn’t work, because it is introduced relatively late in the film. Glenn Close, Hollywood star at the zenith of her success, provides regal presence, further enhanced by famous opera singer Kiri Te Kanawa that borrows her voice in music number; yet Close lacks proper chemistry with Arestrup. Another, much bigger, problem for Meeting Venus is that it relies on audience knowing too much about European 20th Century history as well as Wagner’s opera. Viewers who lack those insights are likely to be disappointed. But, on the other hand, even with those flaws, Meeting Venus is well-made and mostly entertaining film which, in today’s dark times, might make us feel nostalgia toward the era when future seemed quite bright.

RATING: 6/10 (++)