Writer(s): Villaronga
Starring: Gunter Meisner, David Sust, Marisa Paredes, and Gisele Echevarria
Depending upon which angle you approach In a Glass Cage from on the Internet, you may find two very disparate plot descriptions: one makes it sound like a psychological thriller, while the other makes it sound like a revenge flick. Please, please do not go into this thinking that it has anything at all to do with revenge, or you will be severely disappointed (and, quite possibly, baffled and enraged). On the other hand, even if you adapt to the mindset that it's a psychological thriller, you might still be quite disappointed. Truth be told, this is just about as difficult a film to categorize as it is to watch: there are many different elements contained herein, but its apt refusal to stick to any one identity makes for both an interesting viewing experience, and an ironic footnote to its own story.
It is becoming increasingly rare for a movie to capture my attention simply based on its storyline, but In a Glass Cage is one of them that did. Klaus (Gunter Meisner) was a Nazi “doctor” during the Holocaust, who “specialized” in torturing and killing children through heinous medical experiments. Flash forward to the present, where it becomes apparent that old habits do indeed die hard: when we first see him he is taking photographs of a young adult male, hands bound by rope, and dangling from a dank basement ceiling. The youngster looks as if he is dead. But lo and behold, his eyes slowly start to open, which seems to give Klaus some excitement as he trades his camera for a piece of wood, which he uses to deliver the fatal blow.
But years of abusing and murdering children seems to come with a steep psychological price, no matter how much you enjoy it: racked with a sudden and intense guilt over his latest crime, Klaus climbs to the roof of his extravagant house and jumps to his death. Or so he was hoping. In a classic case of karma, the leap doesn't kill him, but instead confines him to an iron lung, an old piece of outdated hospital machinery that pumps air into the patient's lungs. This renders him unable to move, as any separation from the machine will prevent him from being able to breathe.
In the large mansion in which he is permanently confined, he lives with his crusty wife, and main caregiver, Griselda, and young daughter, Rena. A maid stops by three times a week to help the family take care of Klaus, but it's not enough: Griselda is at her wit's end spending every waking hour looking after her incapacitated husband, and decides to hire a nurse. The nurse, hired under suspicious conditions, is Angelo, a young man who may not even be a nurse at all. Griselda has huge reservations about the boy, but Klaus insists that he be the one hired, without even so much as an interview.
It goes without saying that Angelo and Klaus have some kind of history together—that much is evident from the beginning—but the true depths of their “relationship” slowly begin to come out little by little, as the film goes in some unexpected directions. As I alluded to earlier, what would seem to be just a simple, clever, psychological tale of vengeance, turns out to have no revenge in mind at all; it quickly becomes a chilling tale of idolatry that becomes too much even for a man who made a career out of carrying out cruel experiments on children.
In a Glass Cage is frequently noted as one of the most disturbing films of all time, and while I think that title is quite a bit of a stretch (it was nowhere near as grotesque as Salo), it is undeniably unnerving, with several sequences guaranteed to make all but the most hardened pedophiles squirm in their seats. What's most impressive about this, something in stark contrast to the dozens of other “most disturbing” films that consistently popularize such lists, is just how little of anything is actually shown on screen: There is very little blood, there is no actual child nudity (save for the opening scene, where the actor is clearly, at the very least, an older teenager), and there are no graphic sex scenes. A majority of the upsetting scenes are actually spoken, as Angelo reads excerpts from Klaus' old diary, which details the most “memorable” of his old crimes.
Upon immediate retrospection, it might appear as if the decision to leave out explicit scenes wasn't so much a directorial decision as much as it was a legal one—no film could show the scenes hinted at here without being slapped with lawsuits ranging from obscenity, to child pornography. But director Agusti Villaronga, who has parlayed this, his first feature-length film, into a three-decade career, also shows considerable restraint and skill, along with a natural ability to build tension (there is an excellent stalk-and-kill scene that blends realism with some giallo-style exaggerations). He also proves adept at gleaning sadness from the dark material, which in the hands of a lesser director, could have easily come off as merely exploitative. It never feels that way here, as the violence and sexuality, as off-putting as it is, is surrounded by an actual story that requires such tragic details.
Unfortunately, the story isn't always obvious, and the ending gradually starts to go off the deep end. I gather that was the point, and it maintained my interest, but it finishes on a rather baffling note with no closure. I am all for ambiguity in movies, but this is the kind of film that demands a complete finish, especially since all the event's of the first-half are grounded in reality and maintain a logical narrative flow. Its sudden transformation into an almost dreamlike narrative, while admittedly fascinating, lost me a little bit; I just didn't feel like the two parts gelled together all that well to form a complete whole.
What we're left with, however, is a powerful film with a muddled message, but one that's recommended viewing for “alternative” horror fans. It focuses its energy on psychological terror, rather than in your face gore, and that's what makes it such a harrowing film, with moments of truly agonizing intensity. It's uneven in places, but the good definitely outweighs the bad in this case.
Although, the more I think about it, the revenge angle could have been expanded upon and probably yielded an even better film...
RATING: 7/10
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