Apartment Zero
by Martin Donovan
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DVD details
Actor: Colin Firth, Dora Bryan, Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Hart Bochner, Liz SmithDirector: Martin Donovan
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language); Spanish (Original Language)
Format: Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 124 minutes
DVD Release Date: 1999-06-29
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Platinum Disc
DVD Reviews of Apartment Zero
DVD Review: never again...
Summary: 1 Stars
Will I assume a movie is good because of it's reviews! I was fooled here big-time! It was strange, ridiculous and a bit creepy. It moved slowly and what sense it did make was not worth watching. Save your money! The other, more indepth 1 star ratings were spot on.DVD Review: Take It From An Argentine American!
Summary: 5 Stars
This is true cinema. Regardless of the homoerotic storyline, it's also a story of a country (Argentina) and a diverse city (Buenos Aires) reconciling its dark past. Enough good things have been said about Colin Firth and Hart Bochner, but to me, the best part of this DVD are the commentaries. DVD Review: APT.0: The movie is 2 stars,but the DVD commentaries make up for the films shortcomings;PLEASE READ ON
Summary: 5 Stars
I finished watching Martin Donovan's 1988 psychological thriller APARTMENT ZERO with one of my favorite actors,Colin Firth,and scratched my head at the conclusion, then got something to eat saying "What did I just see?".This film had crept into me,even though I truly thought it to be one of the worst I had ever seen.I just couldn't understand the bizarre screenplay, the odd assortment of actors and any of the plot;yet I was totally unsatisfied not to understand what was going on in writer/director Martin Donovan's brain! This is where two 2-hour long commentaries on this DVD made so many things crystal clear, or at least as clear as it could be made.Should anyone HAVE to be told what a director was trying to communicate? I say "NO" if I am paying good money to see something at the theatre;but in this case,I was so willing to learn.That some of the acting in this film was nothing short of brilliant so intrigued me:but with a script and direction that seemed so misguided I was compelled to watch the commentaries (which I have RARELY ever done!)
If you have seen this thriller and had the same dumbfounded reaction as I, then watch both the producer commentary and then the director commentary and you will learn that the confusion that you felt was not unfounded at all.This was a private "baby" of then young novice Martin Donovan who had a very clear picture in his own mind what this film was about,yet willingly admits the myriad of mistakes and shortsightedness that he had then and how he laments that things could have been done differently.His vision never is quite clearly communicated.He admits that he was in a "total state of frenzy all the time" and that his naivete played a great deal into the final outcome of APARTMENT ZERO.Donovan freely admits that many scenes do not make sense.(I agree!) He also admits that he was so intrigued with all of the actors, that he stopped directing and let the actor decide where the scene should go (sometime wisely, and other times not so!) What IS undeniably refreshing in this commentary is the enormous respect that Donovan had/has for Colin Firth, who is truly exceptional in his role as severe recluse Adrian Leduc.Donovan talks candidly,yet with now much-learned wisdom, about all of the severe criticism that this film encountered when it was released.By watching this commentary, then rewatching the film,APARTMENT ZERO may not be a world winner,but it certainly is far more accessible than an initial viewing.
The producer commentary with David Koepp and Stephen Soderbergh is just as enlightening.They talk about the lack of funds, the need to cut corners in a time when you would do anything in order to get your independent film noticed.Family members are used to fill in as actors and even lawsuits and liens were placed against the film until all loans were paid.If anyone thinks making a film is easy,WATCH THE PRODUCER COMMENTARY!
All-in-all, this DVD was one of the most odd yet delightful surprises that any intense film lover,and especially novice writers and directors, could find of great interest and benefit in what to do and what to avoid.There is one undeniable fact about this film,though: Colin Firth shows what an amazing actor he is and what total abandon he puts into this role.This film will never be any better.But, in your mind you can so appreciate it more with just the right amount of information.
DVD Review: When independent films were independent . . .
Summary: 5 Stars
The best thing about this DVD is the commentary by co-writer David Koepp and "special guest" Steven Soderbergh, whose landmark "Sex, Lies and Videotape" dates from the same time period (the late 1980s). The two of them use "Apartment Zero" as a reference point while they discuss the making of movies in general - from writing vs. directing to the most interesting way to present the discovery of a body. Koepp recalls his working relationship with writer/director Martin Donovan and describes the evolution of the film from an allegory about Argentina to the psychological thriller that materialized in the final cut. Director Donovan has his own commentary, but I stuck with Koepp and Soderbergh to the end.
While the film itself feels a bit dated after twenty years, and it takes its own sweet time to explore its possibilities and eventually assume its inevitable direction, there is much to relish along the way. There's no real need for a cross-dresser in the story, for instance, but the film would be diminished without him. (And you have to wonder what was cut from the original three-hour version of the film.) Since 1988, we've seen Colin Firth emerge as a kind of coolly aloof and vaguely mournful romantic hero in just about anything he does, but here he is cast as a young man with what feels like the early onset of dementia, which certainly makes for a change. Meanwhile, the weirdness of his handsome and self-absorbed apartment-mate (Hart Bochner) gives an edge to their relationship that compels a kind of helpless fascination, always defying predictability.
The lesson from the Koepp-Soderbergh commentary is that independent films today have been so commercialized by the studios that they often lack the risk-taking that we see in a film like "Apartment Zero." A viewer today who objects to a film like this one has forgotten or never known what independent filmmaking can mean. For anyone who wants to be reminded, this is a great movie to refresh the memory.
DVD Review: On Assuming Another Identity
Summary: 5 Stars
Apartment Zero
I went to go and see this movie by myself when I had first moved to Los Angeles, California and didn't have any friends. It is a film about how we become those that we love and assume in great part their identities. It is an excellent and very visual movie, taking place in Buenos Aires. It certainly left me moved in the least and understanding just how true the theme really is having gone through something similar myself.
Description of Apartment Zero
A tense psychological thriller, Apartment Zero concerns the intertwining of a loner, film buff Colin Firth (The English Patient) and his new mysterious boarder (Hart Bochner) in present-day Argentina. The new roommate is enigmatic and outgoing, befriending everyone that the poor loner could not. But Firth soon suspects a connection between his boarder's appearance and the reports of bodies in the streets murdered for political reasons.The heart of the film lies in the increasingly bizarre relationship that develops between the two opposites, breeding the seeds of mistrust. An original and offbeat noir-type drama, the film, cowritten by David Koepp (Jurassic Park), proceeds at a slow and deliberate pace, gradually drawing the viewer deeper into the intrigue and isolation of Firth's tortured soul. Some genuinely creepy moments and an all-around macabre mystery make this film worthwhile viewing for mystery fans everywhere. --Robert Lane
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