Nazis guard a citadel that harbors a dangerous force that starts wreaking havoc and death upon them, forcing an uneasy alliance with a Jewish professional who can stop it.
The film was a critical and commercial failure, losing almost three million dollars. Even F. Paul Wilson, who wrote the original novel, says of the movie, "Visually intriguing, but otherwise utterly incomprehensible." I will agree with Wilson about the film being "visually intriguing", particularly some of the earliest shots of the keep and the blue and gray hues used... it is very crisp and stimulating, and any cinematographer should take notes from this one.
Critic Tim Brayton echoes Wilson, saying, "After a brilliant opening act, the plot gets flabbier and flabbier until around the half-way point, when it stops making any sense whatsoever." This may be blamed on the severe editing, or perhaps on Mann's desire to make an epic when the studio would not allow it -- cutting more than half of the film is bound to create plot holes and continuity gaps.
I find it interesting that the last time this film was publicly released was in 1995 on laserdisc, a format that is basically dead. Allegedly, the DVD (or BD) has not been released because they cannot get the rights to the Tangerine Dream songs, and also because Michael Mann has disowned it and apparently prefers his 3.5 hour cut. That Mann has gone on to such success and his film is hard to track down (but available on Netflix) is incredible.
The film was a critical and commercial failure, losing almost three million dollars. Even F. Paul Wilson, who wrote the original novel, says of the movie, "Visually intriguing, but otherwise utterly incomprehensible." I will agree with Wilson about the film being "visually intriguing", particularly some of the earliest shots of the keep and the blue and gray hues used... it is very crisp and stimulating, and any cinematographer should take notes from this one.
Critic Tim Brayton echoes Wilson, saying, "After a brilliant opening act, the plot gets flabbier and flabbier until around the half-way point, when it stops making any sense whatsoever." This may be blamed on the severe editing, or perhaps on Mann's desire to make an epic when the studio would not allow it -- cutting more than half of the film is bound to create plot holes and continuity gaps.
I find it interesting that the last time this film was publicly released was in 1995 on laserdisc, a format that is basically dead. Allegedly, the DVD (or BD) has not been released because they cannot get the rights to the Tangerine Dream songs, and also because Michael Mann has disowned it and apparently prefers his 3.5 hour cut. That Mann has gone on to such success and his film is hard to track down (but available on Netflix) is incredible.