The Discovery of Heaven (2001)

the audience applauded

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Directed by that mediocre Dutch actor Jerome Krabbe, this might as well be a Ken Russell movie: plenty of manic behaviour, disconnected dialogues (sometimes with literary and historic references), etc. Russell isn't much of a director but he certainly made better films than this. The movie is an unfocused, confusing hodge-podge of religious horror, thriller, drama, and comedy.It starts off in Heaven, a dark place in which the angels are like semi-robots with the kind of contempt for humanity that would be more suitable for Hell. The angels discuss something that makes little sense. Then, suddenly, we are in the ever-political 60s, in which two men (Stephen Fry and some other guy) meet and find out they have things in common - hence they soon celebrate their "cosmical brotherhood" in a typical Russellian manner. They meet a cellist (Flora Montgomery) with whom they soon form a silly love triangle, in the best French garbage-movie tradition; no one minds who anyone else is screwing. Ahhh, free love! How very progressive and tolerant of them… Their trip to Cuba is an idiotic affair, not least of all because the "Holy Child" is conceived there, of all places - in Castro's Communist Cuba. Why would angels want this second Christ to be born in the pits of atheism and tyranny? Oh, I forgot: this movie's Heaven is a brooding place, a Purgatory at best. So Flora screws both guys in the same day, and we don't know who the Godchild's father is. Yawn. Various accidents occur in the movie - every which one ends in death or a coma and is instigated by the evil Archangel Gabriel, played uninterestingly by the director Krabbe. After Flora falls in a coma, the child's real father starts having sex with her mother - i.e. his child's grandmother! The child grows up, while this guy seeks for Heaven within an observatory!! Who in his right mind would finance anyone to look for Heaven?? The dope eventually finds it, and is duly killed by the Heavenly ones for this. Fry's wife is also killed - her throat slashed in a bizarre street attack. Eventually, the boy grows up and finds the Ten Commandments and brings them to Israel where he swooshes up into the sky/Heaven with them, and Gabriel is happy but he leaves mankind to disaster because it's been so sinful and atheistic. Sinful? The previous centuries weren't sinful, or? Especially in the name of religion! Non-believing? 95% of today's entire population still believes in God. As you can see, the movie is totally absurd, not at all thought out - and it doesn't even hold on to basic rules of religious thrillers. Merely a silly mess, this movie, hardly an intelligent approach to anything.

This is a very complicated movie, with implications that some people probably will not want to consider. If you can go with the premise and not have a cow at the implications, this is an excellent movie that raises some interesting questions about, God, the universe, relationships and a few more subjects.The overlying plot has God deciding he has had enough of mankind and that he wants the covenant he made with Moses back. To that end he has several angels manipulate events so that a child can be produced who will be able to find the tablets it was written on and return them to heaven. The main plot has to to with the relationship between Onno, Max and Ada, three friends who unwittingly end up the focal point of the divine plot. It would be futile to try to simply explain the plot further since the film is very novel like in its structure and its unfolding.This is a wonderful, heady film that makes you care deeply about all of the characters It also does what great films do, which is make you stop to think about what you believe, while telling you a damn good story. The more I think about it, the more I really like it.The performances, with one exception are first rate. I think this is probably the best thing that Stephen Fry has done to date. His Onno is a wonderful cad, who is also a loving father. A wonderful, Oscar worthy performance.The one exception are the young actors who portray Quentin. The performances are a bit uneven and don't make up a cohesive whole so that when we end up with the actor playing Quentin at 17, we don't particularly care for him much. You do warm to him, but it takes a while.(His part is also a bit odd which doesn't help.) I can't recommend this movie enough. Its a great great film that seems to have gotten lost on its way to a large part of the world. Its the cinematic equivalent of curling up with a really good novel. If you run across this film make an effort to go see, rent or tape it. You may not love it like me, but you certainly will be happy you saw it.

Okay, just watched the movie and finished the book today too, and here's what I think of it (for what it's worth;). The book is of course one of the many masterpieces of Harry Mullisch, most of the serious critics do at least agree on that and who am I to ignore them (and really, I did think it was a great book). The movie however doesn't make me this enthusiastic.I think that on every front on which movies can be criticized, there is something to criticize in this one, leaving it to be, at best, a mediocre movie. I wouldn't go as far as to totally banish the movie into the realm of the unseeables (as the only american reviewer on this page suggests), but their is lot that could be done better. First of all an obvious one, often commented on, the speed is to high. Were jumping from one event to another, sometimes without even noticing what has happened in between. The people who have read the book (the readers) will automatically think "oh, well, this and that have happened" which to me still was irritating sometimes, but what's worse, i can imagine that non-readers will sometimes miss the plot. Now, it is logical that you can't show all 900 pages of events and dialogs in a 2 hour movie, but that still makes the movie's story a lot weaker than the book's story. And you miss a lot of layers, since the philosophical, psychological, scientific, political, developmental and historical elements are almost totally absent. What's left is indeed only a love and mystery/adventure story with some pseudo theological semi spiritual edges. That's only a fraction of what made the original story so attractive. And above that, some of the missing elements were quite essential for a good understanding of the story. The movie tries to solve these 'missing links' by some small changes in the story, which I don't object too in principle, but it does make the mystery/adventure story a lot weaker. It doesn't surprise me that the hardest reviews come from the non-readers (my advise to them, read the book!).Well, perhaps there can still be some good in the entire movie if we see it as the "pictures" that go with the book. A mere illustration of the people and places. It could be this, and it could be a great project. But then I'd expect to see overwhelming acting, great direction, and a script that is beautifully adapted for play. Sadly (and I must add here that this is of course a personal feeling) the movie failed here too. Well, there were two specks of light in this darkness (okay, that's perhaps a bit too strong, but admit that it sounds good!:), Stephen Fry (Onno) and Neil Newbon (Quinten). Luckily two good (not great mind!, Newbon because he's just not great, only good, Fry because he's only great when he's being funny, and although there are some humorous scenes, sometimes he has to be serious too) actors. The rest were okay but nothing special or sometimes even below average (but these are only minor roles, like the girl in the toilet, who greets ada:"Hi Ada!" the 'personal-friend-of-the-director-who-acted-when-she-was-in-high-school'-ness oozes off of it;). And why oh why did Jeroen Krabbé have to give himself a role again? Well, he always seemed pretty vain to me, so probably that's it. Anyway, he's not a terrible actor, but I do think that most actors could have done a better job.But still, the main actor might be (very) good at their jobs, dialogues were often terrible I think, because of the terrible script. Not even the best actor can change that. Although I almost feel I'm doing the movie injustice be saying it so hard, still.... Well, perhaps this is to be attributed to the speed of the movie, since a lot of info has to come in very short conversations.As for the direction of the whole movie (which is done by Jeroen Krabbé for those who didn't know), I would say it is mediocre, some times a bit worse, sometimes reasonable. Heaven looked ok to me, but most scenes were not so spectacular. On the one hand this is logical, since they're mainly about the ordinary lives of some people, on the other hand, it would be nice to see the important events a bit more climaxic, in music, cameraviews, etc. Still, I liked some, like the 'conception of Quinten' scene for instance. The Sanctui Sanctorum (if that's what it was, I can only remember the dutch name) however is the other side. But perhaps this is also to be ascribed to the speed of the movie. There's just not enough to time to show you every important event or place or conversation in a restful moment, and that means that you can't really create atmosphere. And at least I think that that's very important, certainly if you want your movie to be an, or even better, the illustration of a book.Perhaps you could say that the movie tries to tell you both the entire story in a way that everybody (readers and non-readers) will follow it, and to show you the beauty of places, events and conversations that the book evokes, but by doing so fails miserably in both fields. This leaves the non-reader confused over the enthusiasm of the readers, who desperately try to explain to them why the story (and thus the movie) is so great. Really a shame, since the book actually is really really really great. Therefore I shall give it a five out of ten. Now go out, away from you computers and tv's, buy it, and read it! Love and Greetings, Menno

There is a lot to say about the movie, but I think you should enjoy it yourself. For me it was balancing the odds. First of all Harry Mulisch is not your average writer. I could never get into his books. You might wonder why bother? Well that can be told in two words 'the Assault'. It got a Oscar, but even beyond that. The movie is an amazing story about the life of a boy that changes when a collaborator is executed in front of his house. The second factor was Jeroen Krabbe. He is an okay actor. Over the big international field nothing fantastic but for Dutch terms one of the best actors we have. When I saw his movie 'left luggage' I was totally overwhelmed. As a director he is at least 10 times better then as an actor. These factors made me check out 'The Discovery of Heaven.' The book I could never read. Well, it was an amazing journey. From the very beginning you will be mesmerized with the images of places unlike you would expect. The dialogues, the personality of the people and the settings. It is almost like the settings in the world politics were set up especially for these events. I think that the most amazing part is that you can go through the dialogues without ever wondering when the next action scene will be. Jeroen plays with the settings like they are part of the conversation itself.But what is it about? Well apparently god is not too pleased with the way the world turns. So he decides to remove his influence. This can only be done by sending someone down to get the tablets. So two men will meet a woman, the beautiful Ada Brons (Flora Montgomery) one will become the father and the child will grow up slowly receiving the images that will lead to the tablets containing the 10 commandments. The only problem is that time is running out. God's deadline must be met. I can't wait to get this one on DVD.