X
- 2014
- Not Rated
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 2 h 2 m
- 2014
- Not Rated
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 2 h 2 m
Summary More than two decades after catapulting to stardom with The Princess Bride, an aging actress (Robin Wright, playing a version of herself) decides to take her final job: preserving her digital likeness for a future Hollywood. Through a deal brokered by her loyal, longtime agent (Harvey Keitel) and the head of Miramount Studios (Danny Hust...
Written By: Stanislaw Lem
- 2014
- Not Rated
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 2 h 2 m
- 2014
- Not Rated
- Cinedigm Entertainment Group
- 2 h 2 m
The Congress
63
6.8
Where to Watch
Summary More than two decades after catapulting to stardom with The Princess Bride, an aging actress (Robin Wright, playing a version of herself) decides to take her final job: preserving her digital likeness for a future Hollywood. Through a deal brokered by her loyal, longtime agent (Harvey Keitel) and the head of Miramount Studios (Danny Hust...
Written By: Stanislaw Lem
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 31 Critic Reviews
63
52% Positive
16 Reviews
16 Reviews
45% Mixed
14 Reviews
14 Reviews
3% Negative
1 Review
1 Review
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 31 Critic Reviews
63
52% Positive
16 Reviews
16 Reviews
45% Mixed
14 Reviews
14 Reviews
3% Negative
1 Review
1 Review
A wholly original and thoroughly surprising fusion of sensory overload and liberal philosophy bound to confuse and provoke in equal measures.
Ari Folman’s genre mash-up The Congress could use a freakier title, something either more appealing or appalling to go with the weird, sometimes wonderful visions flowing through it.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 52 User Ratings
6.8
60% Positive
31 Ratings
31 Ratings
35% Mixed
18 Ratings
18 Ratings
6% Negative
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 52 User Ratings
6.8
60% Positive
31 Ratings
31 Ratings
35% Mixed
18 Ratings
18 Ratings
6% Negative
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
Imagine a world where experience could be inhaled like a pharmaceutical. There would be no need for movies, because the direct experience of another life is always available - we wouldn't have to see it, we would be it. In this reality, personal identity would cease to be something stable and defined; your identity could shift from moment to moment as you live unlimited possible experiences. The real world already has trouble competing with fantasy, but with this pharmaceutical, fantasy would become the reality, and how many people would truly accept their normal life if an unlimited number of experiences and adventures was always instantly available? This is the question the movie asks, and the future it terrifyingly predicts. "I am your prophet of doom" says the Robin Wright character, as she describes this future. In this way, it shares similar conceits with The Matrix, another movie built on the fact that reality is entirely a creation of the mind. But unlike The Matrix, The Congress posits that most people would happily embrace a fantastic false reality over our default one.
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Basically a 2 part act with the first one introducing the main characters and the second one showing weird interpretations of them through a purple haze. In the first act you get wonderful character building and one great monologue that would make even the most stubborn individual break down and cry. The second act brings you the mystery as you try to figure out what is really going on in the real world while we are stuck in an insane animated sequence that is as fascinating as it is strange.
The pacing in this movie is awkward at best. The second act does seem to drag. It is also apparent that other than the great animation that there was not much left in the budget for practical effects. These shortcomings though do nothing to diminish the quality of this film. This is just so rare to get a sci-fi film that is original and unconventional these days that it is refreshing like a glass of crystal clear water in a summer afternoon. If you have the chance to see this on a larger screen then please take advantage of that before it goes away. The larger than life aspect does seem to take advantage of it. This movie has a 'Total Recall' aspect to it that will keep your friends discussing this after the movie is over.
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The Congress doesn’t fully live up to its lofty ambitions, but it does attempt something most filmmakers wouldn’t even dream of — a dystopian blend of live-action and animation that acidly comments on some of Hollywood’s touchiest issues before drifting off into an existential fog.
Lem’s story is merely a springboard for Folman’s wildly sprawling meditations on what the advent of virtual performance means — for artistic integrity, creative spirit, celebrity culture, human identity, even our hold on reality.
Ambition markedly outstrips achievement in The Congress, a visionary piece of speculative fiction that drops the ball after a fine set-up.
It’s a folly of the first order, but one that many people will nonetheless want to see, if only because it’s so out there.
The film is ambitious and heartfelt, with pressing concerns about the virtualization and fantasization of reality. But it’s a blunder, one interesting mostly for what it might have been.
The world is changing very fast. Are you ready to sail along...?
An Israel-French co-productioned English language movie. The movie was both live action and animation which divides into two equal parts in the 2 hour movie. The movie chronicles the tale of an actress who travels different medium of the world during her second half of the life. The actress role was played by Robin Wright as herself.
Actually, it was better than I expected. It opens with a plain drama about a middle aged actress who suffers from the lack of offers to play in the movies. She has to agree with whatever the proposal comes her way for the sake of the future of her career. And that is the end of live action, then the screenplay begins to turn into an animation which illustrated similar to the movie 'Inception'. In a dream like world, everything can be possible with a creative mind. After becoming old the actress sails into the cartoon world for some reason, but meets a guy in a chaos created by the rebels. What follows next is possibly driven to the confusion between reality and the fictional world.
In the history of world cinema there are plenty of movies we can find where live action and animation collides. This movie was such a concept with extraordinary flavours. Some people did not like the movie mainly for the style of animations that rendered in it, but I was pleased. They did not go for 3D animation, for cast and storyline like this it would have cost a lot which won't earn back in the distribution market. The whole movie to present in live action, people would have complained about copying the idea of 'Inception'. So I feel as it is, it was so cool and clever. You should understand it properly to get the point of the movie the writer and director trying to say. Veritably, it was a fine adaptation from a novel by the visionary sci-fi writer.
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the congress is very well made movie. it has a compelling story about identity and escaping reality, very good performances (especially from Robin Wright) and some amazing animation. it's major flaw is it's length and it's pacing, the film has a lot of padding and at times feels like it's 2 movies forced together and as a result the themes and messages feel confused. but at it's heart this is an impressive film it just should have been shorter and i believe it will appeal to a lot of people particularly art house fans
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Israeli director Ari Folman’s fourth film, THE CONGRESS is the much anticipated follow-up after his Oscar-nominated animation-documentary WALTZ WITH BASHIR (2008), which to my ruefulness I have yet to watch, since I am eternally lagging in the field of documentaries, let alone a war documentary.
THE CONGRESS has an intrinsically distinctive allure of its own because it is a film creatively amalgamate live-action with animation, and inspired by Stanislaw Lem’s Sci-Fi novel THE FUTUROLOGICAL CONGRESS, it ambitiously challenges to handle a thornier theme of human race’s incorrigible addiction to chemicals which ultimately erase all one egos than it appears to suggest, a showbiz industry agism satire and the advance of technology which foreshadows the doom of the line of actor (which both FINALE FANTSY: THE SPIRITS WITHIN 2001, and the film itself can justify at least for now, animation cannot replace real actors, live-capture may be a more probable contrivance).
continue reading my review on my blog: google cinema omnivore, thanks
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It just didn't work.
Stanisław Lem, like Philip K. **** and Theodore Sturgeon, is tough to get right. This film's portrayal of drugged Utopian fantasy seemed too silly and simply did not fit with the rest of the movie's tone.
Robin Wright was solid throughout but once the movie arrives at The Congress there just wasn't much she could do to help.
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With a great concept, a promising beginning and an effective performance from Wright as herself, Ari Folman really overthought this piece, and it just descends into animated nonsense. After spending quite a while trying and occasionally succeeding in making you think, it struggles to keep you awake through its long and painfully drawn out conclusion.
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Production Company
Bridgit Folman Film Gang,
Pandora Filmproduktion,
Opus Film,
Paul Thiltges Distributions,
Entre Chien et Loup,
ARD Degeto Film,
ARP Sélection,
Belgacom,
Canal+ Polska,
Casa Kafka Pictures Movie Tax Shelter Empowered by Belfius,
Centre du Cinéma et de l'Audiovisuel de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles,
Channel 10,
Cinemorphic,
Cinéfinance Tax Shelter,
Deutscher Filmförderfonds (DFFF),
Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein,
Filmförderungsanstalt (FFA),
Filmstiftung Nordrhein-Westfalen,
France 2 Cinéma,
Instytucja Filmowa Silesia-Film,
Israel Film Fund,
Liverpool,
Luxembourg Film Fund,
MEDIA Programme of the European Union,
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg,
Polski Instytut Sztuki Filmowej,
Pôle Image de Liège,
Radio Télévision Belge Francophone (RTBF),
Sikhya Entertainment
Release Date Aug 29, 2014
Duration 2 h 2 m
Rating Not Rated
Tagline What would you give for an eternal youth? [Scandinavian Blu-ray]
Awards
Austin Fantastic Fest
• 3 Wins & 3 Nominations
Sitges - Catalonian International Film Festival
• 1 Win & 2 Nominations
International Cinephile Society Awards
• 1 Win & 2 Nominations