Hard to Be a God

Lensed in a monochrome palette of ash-grays, late Russian filmmaker Aleksei German's adaptation of the 1964 classic sci-fi novel by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky is a total-immersion wallow in feudal barbarism. The book's original storyline—following human scientists who secretly infiltrate the society of an Earth-like but Dark Ages planet—is almost completely drowned in a carefully choreographed but gruelingly nonstop parade of roiling gloom, torture, brutality, filth, steam, rain, slime, rape, blood, and snot (at which point one is grateful for the black-and-white cinematography). Here, while a savage purge by the local tyrant rids the land of its thinkers, writers, and inventors, undercover Earth-man Rumata (Leonid Yarmolnik) is barely protected thanks to his fighting prowess and sham identity as a noble lord who, according to peasant dogma, is descended from a god. Ultimately, Rumata will abandon his neutrality and lash out. Hard to Be a God serves up one impressively restless continuous-take sequence after another—featuring grimacing goons, opaque dialogue, lots of muck, edged weapons, body armor, and some of the best faux-medieval costumes outside Lord of the Rings (although here the similarities end). More bludgeon-y than sci-fi, this near-three-hour epic is an optional purchase. (C. Cassady)