Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		4.0

Hell Blu-ray Movie Review

All the World's a Desert

Reviewed by Michael Reuben August 21, 2012

"Hell" is the German word for "bright", and Hell is a Swiss-German film about a world ravaged by excess sunlight. No one know exactly what's gone wrong, but it's more than just global warming. The film joins a host of dystopian thrillers that includes the Mad Max films (especially the second two), The Book of Eli, The Road and Time of the Wolf, but its strength lies in its modest scale. The story follows a small group of people who are thoroughly ordinary, and neither the film nor its characters try to articulate big ideas about humanity or civilization. It just shows individuals trying to survive using skills that aren't well-suited to their current situation.

As far as I have been able to determine, Hell was released to theaters in Germany, where it also won various awards at film festivals. In the U.S., it skipped theaters and is being released directly to video by ARC Entertainment, with both an original language track (subtitled) and an English dub track.

After a text screen explaining that the year is 2016 and the earth's temperature has risen by ten degrees Celsius (which equals eighteen degrees Fahrenheit), Hell opens with a sequence that is badly handled by both the English subtitles and the English dub track. A young couple has suffered a car wreck. The man is trapped in the overturned auto, and the woman, who has been thrown clear of the car, tries to free him. They're speaking French. A German-speaking audience would notice this immediately, and it's crucial identifying information, because the dry, dusty world of Hell, in which everyone covers as much of their body as possible, often makes it difficult to distinguish one person from another—and viewers need a way of separating this man and woman from others we're about to meet. In German prints, their dialogue was no doubt subtitled, and it's subtitled here too, but there's no indication that they're speaking a different language from the rest of the film. You have to listen closely (and know the two languages) to catch the difference.

The English dub track is even more misleading, because the voices are dubbed into English without so much as an accent to indicate that these speakers are "foreign". In any case, the brief, frantic dialogue suggests that the couple's condition is not the result of a random accident. Others approach, the woman runs, and the screen goes black.

The story resumes in a car with most of the windows crudely taped over to prevent sunlight from entering. It has three occupants: the driver, Phillip (Lars Eidinger); his girlfriend, Marie (Hannah Herzsprung); and her younger sister, Leonie (Lisa Vicari). With resources almost exhausted, they've packed up everything they can find and are heading toward the mountains, where rumors say that survivors have water. Some even claim that rain has resumed above the tree line. The sighting of a single bird is considered a good omen, because most animals have died for lack of food and water.

Before long, a fourth person joins the group. His name is Tom (Stipe Erceg), and all anyone knows about him is that he's familiar with car engines and probably once worked as a mechanic. Otherwise, he's thirsty, starving and desperate like everyone else.

The foursome comes upon a scene that includes the wreckage of the French couple's car, and that's where they encounter unexpected adversaries. They become separated, and Marie wanders the barren land, searching for her sister. Lost and hopeless, she is rescued by a local farm woman, Bäurin (Angela Winkler, star of The Tin Drum and The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum for Volker Schlondörff). Bäurin gives Marie water, then takes her to the family farm, which is now devoid of livestock but has become the site of a new type of rural society organized by Bäurin and her family to adapt to the extreme conditions in which they find themselves. It gradually dawns on Marie that her rescue came at a price.

The description above is deliberately sketchy, because director Tim Fehlbaum, who also co-wrote the script, has designed Hell to be experienced from the point of view of its major characters, primarily Marie. The story unfolds almost in real time, and it would be a disservice to viewers to relate too much detail in advance. Fehlbaum uses a desaturated palette and extreme contrasts between the overbright day and unlit night (electricity being a thing of the past) to make ordinary settings look otherworldly. But in a technique that has always worked well for post-apocalyptic cinema, he routinely throws in reminders that this alien landscape is our world fast- forwarded to a possible future: Evian bottles, the bright yellow of canned peaches, a dusty candy bar wrapper, a familiar pop song (in this case, the Eighties classic "99 Luftballons", which becomes a key sound cue).

Fehlbaum also makes effective use of the claustrophobia that is the paradoxical result of the blazing sun, which requires the survivors to keep themselves shielded. Instead of the wide open spaces where humanity used to roam free, they're forced to peer at the world through goggles or narrow slits in boarded up windows or walls. The recurrent imagery of tight spaces is a constant visual reminder that this is a world where every other person is a potential competitor for vanishing supplies of food and water. It helps explain why people like Marie, Leonie and Phillip set off on a risky expedition based on nothing more than rumor. The same reality also explains the actions taken by people they encounter on their journey.

Hell Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Hell bears the unmistakable stamp of digital photography. (IMDb says Red One, which seems to be the site's default listing for any digitally acquired film, but Hell's credits didn't include the usual "Shot on Red" logo.) The film's subject matter is ideally suited to the harsh, desaturated look that comes naturally to digital footage. Here, that look has been exaggerated even further in post-production to simulate a world where the sun is so bright that people can burn to death in a matter of hours without protective clothing. Care has been taken, however, so that the deliberately overcranked contrast doesn't blow out essential detail in areas of the frame where it's important that we see what is happening.

The same kind of care is evident in night and indoor scenes, which establish a strong contrast with the overlit daytime exteriors. It is critical that the blacks in these scenes not be crushed, so that fine gradations are preserved to render detail; and indeed, at no point does the action or the detail of the actors' performance in these scenes become indistinct. (If it does, then I suggest checking your display's calibration.) Still images do not fully capture the quality of these scenes, but in motion they're impressive.

With digital acquisition and post-production, there was presumably no analog phase in the transition to Blu-ray. I certainly saw no indications of artificial sharpening or high frequency filtering. Compression artifacts were non-existent, nor would I expect any on an 89-minute film with only a few trailers for extras.

Hell Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The film's original German (and occasionally French) track is presented in DTS-HD MA 5.1, and it's a terrific mix with small sounds of the unnatural, arid environment routinely popping up around you. It starts right at the outset, when rubble from the car wreck in the opening scene rattles downhill to your left and behind you. After that, there are weird sounds inside the moving car, at Bäurin's farm, in the seared forests and in various locales that should (but may not) be deserted. Dry, dusty winds are a common presence. My German is good enough to know that the dialogue is being delivered clearly. The musical score by Lorenz Dangel (The Robber) is atmospheric, suspenseful and beautifully delivered.

(Note: On my player, the English subtitles were not switched on by default. Be sure to check your settings before hitting "play".)

Hell Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Theatrical Trailer (HD, 1080p; 2.35:1; 1:12): This English-language trailer makes the film look like some sort of zombie movie, which it isn't.


• Addtional Trailer: At startup the disc plays a trailer (in 1080p) for Greystone Park, which can be skipped with the chapter forward button and is not otherwise available once the disc loads.

Hell Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I thought the post-apocalyptic road movie had worn out its welcome, but I found Hell a surprisingly effective thriller, because Fehlbaum went back to basics, even more so than John Hillcoat in The Road. The story of a world stripped of all our familiar comforts works best when it's spare and elemental. For the moment, I think Fehlbaum holds the prize for minimalism. Highly recommended.