Rent Black Cat, White Cat (1998)

Send in the clowns - Black Cat, White Cat review by TE

Another Kusturica film that has not aged well. 'Black Cat White Cat' is a kind of Balkan 'Carry On...' film, but with ruder jokes. A typical routine sees an obese woman singer concluding her act by pulling a six-inch nail from a plank with her buttocks. There is a lot of circus-style falling over and knocking things about and smashing crockery.

There is a constant wild energy that simply gets tiresome after a while. You get the impression that the entire cast must have been jacked up on mega-amphetamines before each scene. There is so much slapstick that some of the 'slap' does 'stick', giving the occasional belly laugh, but such moments are drowned in the self-consciously madcap mayhem (much as the film's villain is almost drowned in liquidised shit at the end...don't worry, he wipes himself clean with live geese).

Successful farce has some underlying structure, and makes effective use of changes of pace. This film just exhausts without giving enough back.

Bizarre, hugely enjoyable fabulist romp - Black Cat, White Cat review by MH

Great characters, a real sense of place and the oddities of life in the Balkans.

Even the occasional overlong episode ends up forming part of a wholly enjoyable patchwork.

A boisterous must-see film, with a must-hear soundtrack.

Black Cat, White Cat - Black Cat, White Cat review by sh

sometime you'll hold a story or event from your own life so close to your heart, kept in the chamber of the mouth to tell instantly because its full of wild things, happenstance, things someone said that felt like it was the first time anyone said it, the physical movement of a slip, the roaring of blood to your face as you cried with laughter, the theme-park gut drop as you went pale with fear. the full story rounded into a perfectly sanded sphere you love regaling.

thats Black Cat, White Cat.

a pig eating a car, a dead man strung to a rail crossing pole with an umbrella, a man cleaning shite off himself with a live goose, a bride escaping her own wedding by hiding in a fake tree stump, a dead body wearing an ice bag facemask, a giant driving around a decorated shed on the back of a yute.

Kusturica's vision is one massively of completely charmed chaos, where it feels like there are about 40 people behind the camera choreographing the scene, but they fell asleep on the take they used. its so pulsating, rhythmic. weird and funny. theres almost nothing as completely defined and directed, yet so shambolic and physical.

its like he sold his soul to the gods of timing.

his kitchen-sinked gypsy aesthetics feel like a themepark made in a scrapyard. hoses, broken kettles, upended tables. a complete dust-junk heaven.

if you ever wanted to see and feel the chaotic miasma of a shotgun wedding, Black Cat White Cat gives you: a shotgun wedding, a double wedding, death, resurrection and a sleeping child and an old man being launched out a car on their wheelchair with a goat.

genuinely the most joyous experience ive had all year watching films. this is so so fucking funny man. probably shouldve been as big as Delicatessen (1991) tbh

please watch this