The Turin Horse

Hungarian director Béla Tarr's The Turin Horse is a challenging drama that is “an auteurist triumph” (in the words of New York Times critic Manohla Dargis)—bittersweet praise when you know that Tarr (at age 56) has said this will be his final film. Shot in crisp, hard-edged black-and-white and comprised of only 30 long-take scenes, The Turin Horse was inspired by a tragic incident in the life of philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. In 1889, while in Turin, Italy, Nietzsche witnessed a cab driver whipping his stubborn, unmoving horse. Nietzsche threw his arms around the beaten horse's neck. Afterwards—in a matter of days—Nietzsche lost consciousness and, ultimately, his mind. But this is not Nietzsche's story; instead, Tarr (with co-director and longtime partner Ágnes Hranitzky) follows the partially paralyzed driver and his recalcitrant horse home to the windswept plain where he and his daughter live in a state of bleak, stilted routine. Over the course of six days, we witness (in the director's own words) “the unbearable heaviness of being.” Although certainly not for all tastes, The Turin Horse is highly recommended. (J. Shannon)