The Fall of the House of Usher (1982)

Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Just perfect...

How sad is this?

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

"The Fall of the House of Usher" is definitely my favorite story by the great American write Edgar Allan Poe due to its legitimate creepiness and heavy atmosphere. With this 15 minute long stop motion animated short film, the master filmmaker Jan Svankmajer attempts to translate Poe's beautifully atmospheric writing to the language of cinema, and does so with much success.I would like to note that the animation in this film is fantastic, as it is in all of Svankmajer's works. You can tell that a lot of effort was put into the stop motion, and it looks absolutely spectacular and adds to the eeriness of the short.Other than the animation and haunting atmosphere, this short is really just a reading of the original Poe story. None of the characters appear on screen, and there is only one narrator. It works quite well, but I do admit that more creativity could have been inserted into the project. However, I'm not necessarily complaining, because the animation and moodiness of this film are enough for me to highly recommend it.

This version of "The Fall of the House of Usher" is amazingly strange--which shouldn't be much of a surprise since it's by the surrealist stop-motion filmmaker, Jan Svankmajer. Only he would make such an odd film. Think about it--the Poe story with absolutely no actors in it whatsoever! Instead, there is a narrator while all kids of weird things occur in a very old home which looks abandoned. You'll see closeups of walls, lumps of clay that mold themselves and a coffin that drags itself to an interment. None of it makes any sense--though that is exactly the point in a surrealist film. But, because it is so strange and difficult to approach, I can't see this art film appealing to most--just lovers of Svankmajer's work and people who like artsy-fartsy stuff. As for me, I can respect what he did, but I certainly didn't enjoy it very much.

Typically adaptations of literature in this style do not operate well--where the original text is overlaid in voice over against images, either the words clash with the imagery or reinforce it too much, making the experience of either watching or reading redundant. Instead of populating the house with Usher, his sister, and his friend, however, Svankmajer lets the elements, space, and furniture speak of its own characterization while a very good reading of the short story plays over some of Svankmajer's signature stop motion animation. It has been a while since I've read the short story, but from my memory of it this is the text in exactness and entirety, so that's really good. The storm and the abode are satisfyingly Gothic, and a really good graphic match between animated clay and a tree's roots are but one of many examples of the muddy and hazy quality of all of the imagery in this movie which weighs down with its dark Romantic tone. Svankmajer at least managed to hit the spirit of the story, if not the character's faces.--PolarisDiB

Couldn't really enjoy this as much as I'd like to. It seems that the entire poem is recited here - problem is I don't understand Czech and the visuals while good don't really stand on their own. This is one case where subtitles don't really work because they prevent the visuals from being appreciated. Someone should redo this with the poem recited in English. I don't think Mr Svankmajer would object. For a better Poe work by Svankmajer check out The Pit, the Pendulum and Hope. Actually, that movie's the best Poe adaptation I've ever seen. Both of these films can be found on the recently released two DVD set of Svankmajer short films called Collected Shorts Of Jan Svankmajer.