Having seen Peter Greenaway's The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover, I knew I was in for an intense sensual experience with crude symbolism and even cruder people. A Zed & Two Noughts is a film about symmetry, about its dependence and complimentary tendencies, accidental/natural or intentional/forced. The twins become obsessed with the search of purpose in randomness and therefore especially the meaning for coincidence and symmetry. Although they come up empty handed, there are some profound ideas in there, with nine months for a baby to be born and then nine months for a body to decay. The arresting visuals reflect the use of symmetry with elaborate sets designed as reflections. It has a David Lean level of lushness as the cameras glide through the elegantly coloured sets, as well as featuring time lapses of decaying food and animals, closeups of painting and nature documentary footage, narrated by David Attenborough.
Although it has shocking drama and daring tragedy (a woman voluntarily having a second leg amputated then regretting it, a dalmatian shown rotting) it does have a key sense of humour that keeps it from being dreary. It mostly comes from Greenaway's obsession with obscenities clashing within upper class etiquette, particularly with sex, which gives the film more shock value though is never vulgar for the sake of vulgarity. It has an incredibly haunting score by Michael Nyman, who also did the one for The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover, and this one may be even more intense due to the films freakish nature. Of which the script is full of twists of turns of phrases and wordplay to apply to the bizarre scenarios in the film, which isn't always as intelligent as it appears to be. The film has a bad habit of relying on characterisations rather than characters, and it took far too long for its protagonists and primary supporting characters to be fully fleshed out and developed beyond caricatures. It's main downfall is it's far too urgent. Scenes are rushed and sequences hurried with barely any scenes properly savoured enough to soak in the flavour of the film. It gives the film a vignette feel which I didn't think the film needed and a resolution without real closure. Though I guess this exactly fits into its theme of chaos and the meaning of it all.
8/10
Although it has shocking drama and daring tragedy (a woman voluntarily having a second leg amputated then regretting it, a dalmatian shown rotting) it does have a key sense of humour that keeps it from being dreary. It mostly comes from Greenaway's obsession with obscenities clashing within upper class etiquette, particularly with sex, which gives the film more shock value though is never vulgar for the sake of vulgarity. It has an incredibly haunting score by Michael Nyman, who also did the one for The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover, and this one may be even more intense due to the films freakish nature. Of which the script is full of twists of turns of phrases and wordplay to apply to the bizarre scenarios in the film, which isn't always as intelligent as it appears to be. The film has a bad habit of relying on characterisations rather than characters, and it took far too long for its protagonists and primary supporting characters to be fully fleshed out and developed beyond caricatures. It's main downfall is it's far too urgent. Scenes are rushed and sequences hurried with barely any scenes properly savoured enough to soak in the flavour of the film. It gives the film a vignette feel which I didn't think the film needed and a resolution without real closure. Though I guess this exactly fits into its theme of chaos and the meaning of it all.
8/10