The Silence Before Bach

Avant-garde director Pere Portabella's The Silence Before Bach offers an oddball tribute to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach—a cornerstone of modern Western culture—told through a series of near-hallucinatory episodes that alternate with more prosaic “narrative” segments. Portabella begins with an evocative image of a player piano literally sauntering across the floor of an art gallery while performing one of the Goldberg Variations. Later, we see a clip of cellists playing a movement from a suite while riding on an otherwise deserted subway car. Balancing these quasi-surrealistic moments are a re-creation of Bach's home life, an excerpt of a Bach impersonator's spiel to tourists in Leipzig, and a dramatization of the myth about Mendelssohn rediscovering the St. Matthew Passion on a bloodied sheet of paper in which his butcher had wrapped a piece of meat. Other scenes capture the contemporary influence of the master's music, such as when a truck driver plays Bach on his harmonica while his partner drives their rig, or a tour boat guide in Dresden juxtaposes the composition of the Goldberg Variations with the World War II fire-bombing of the city. A final interview with the current cantor of the St. Thomas church in Leipzig reinforces the continuing power of Bach's compositions, particularly his religious works. While anyone seeking a straightforward documentary on the composer should look elsewhere, this is an imaginative salute to his genius that will reward more adventurous viewers. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (F. Swietek)