Cloaked in fog, submerged in earth and drenched in rain, Karrer plods his way through life.
Béla Tarr’s Kárhozat (Damnation) is a masterpiece of atmosphere and cinematographic storytelling. The flowing black-and-white images show a world that sinks into sadness and seems to cease to exist. Only stray dogs could still feel at home here, and yet it is beautiful. A kind of hope is drawn from the mud. In this limbo the grip is so hard to find that Karrer has to approach reality from a different perspective. The film distills life to its essence.
