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Cowards Bend the Knee

Cowards Bend the Knee

2003
Romance
1h 0m
A 10-part penny dreadful, a peepshow melodrama, loosely conceived around the filmmaker's autobiography, with an aesthetic that is one part "Vampire" serial, one part psycho fever-dream. (Film Forum)
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Cowards Bend the Knee

2003
Romance
1h 0m
Your probable score
Avg Percentile 60.99% from 168 total ratings

Ratings & Reviews

(168)
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Rated 14 Jan 2009
76
58th
Another twisted melodrama from autobiographical fragments of Maddin's life. Sort of a surrealist version of The Hands of Orlac. I have to resist the urge to label Maddin's work as "random", because when you describe it, it sounds like gibberish. But it all makes perfect sense at the time. Okay maybe not PERFECT sense, but some kind of sense. Not as captivating as Brand, but at least with Maddin you know you're gonna see stuff you've never seen before. I was a bit put off by the rapid editing.
Rated 12 Mar 2013
80
68th
I love the aesthetic of this film, how it crosses silent film techniques with low budget filmmaking and then edits it at a million miles an hour jumping and flickering around as if this is all in someone's head jumping from thought to thought on a whim and repeating moments, getting stuck, focusing in on something &c. Cowards is both incredibly fun and very disturbing, even nightmarish, joyously demented, delightfully odd.
Rated 26 Jun 2021
84
79th
Guy's hyper-rhythmic style comes to fruition here, he's mastered getting the look he wants and now he's going to shoot so much shit he can just machine-gun images into your brain for an hour. Maybe his most kinetic feature, I love it. The sense of humor finally shines through, and even the incest/roleplay stuff actually makes a point this time.
Rated 01 Nov 2009
7
80th
Fucking weird as hell, but if you're familiar with Maddin, that's not a bad thing. It's not for everyone, but I liked it.
Rated 19 Feb 2010
44
6th
Ok, I give up. That's now three exercises in laborious eccentricity I've sat through, courtesy of Guy Maddin. I've only liked his short, The Heart of the World, and his ballet, Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary. Everything else, including this one, has worn my patience quickly with gobs of camp, vamping, and studious weirdness. There's just nothing here for me to latch onto.
Rated 23 Aug 2010
70
69th
This was originally done as an art installation, so it makes sense that it is Maddin's most experimental and challenging film. Consequentially, in my opinion it is ultimately also his least satisfying feature work that i have seen to date. However, that said it is still full of all the typical Maddin touches that one could expect from his films, so it is hardly a failure by anyone else's standards.
Rated 15 Apr 2011
88
81st
Overflowing with memories, images, cultural fragments, and energy, and edited with enough fervor to give a Soviet a heart attack. I'd love to see it in its installation form.
Rated 22 Oct 2011
35
90th
"Cowards Bend the Knee is paradoxically retrograde and ultramodern." - Eric Henderson
Rated 16 May 2012
86
84th
Crazy and twisted silent story. I love the way Maddin paces his films, the enigmatic visuals, the surreal yet understandable narrative and the expressive performances.
Rated 20 Feb 2016
17
93rd
Star Rating: ★★★★1/2

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