I Promise

(ICH GELOBE) ((AUSTRIAN))

A Filmladen release (Austria) of a DorFilm production. Produced by Danny Krausz, Milan Dor. Directed, written by Wolfgang Murnberger.

Berger ... Christoph Dostal
Rumpler ... Andreas Lust
Moser ... Andreas Simma
Kernstock ... Marcus J. Carney
Tomschitz ... Leopold Altenburg

"I Promise" is writer/director Wolfgang Murnberger's personal view of a young man's required army service and his meditations on life and God. Dreams, daydreams and reality merge in a seamless blend of the conscious and subconscious. Pic, which closed the recent Vienna Film Festival, is Austria's entry for the Oscars and has already won the Austrian Film Commission's prize for best film of the year. However, its richly textured dialogue will require first-class translation to work offshore.

Berger (Christoph Dostal), a quiet, less than enthusiastic soldier, spends most of his free time in a latrine stall (his "one square meter of freedom"), counting the days and etching a medieval fantasy on the back of the door.

The plot, which follows Berger and his buddies through their unexceptional training and soulless search for weekend sex, is the framework for the pic's real substance -- Berger's thoughts and dreams, and helmer Murnberger's quirky vision of army life.

Movie's opening sequence, in moody B&W, is like something out of Ingmar Bergman's "The Seventh Seal." A knight enters a ravaged castle, where two women survive. One squirts him with breast milk; the other, Berger runs through with his lance. Sequence turns out to be a dream, from which Berger awakens to the shouts of his drill sergeant and ordinary life, in color.

Images from the dream reappear through the film in their real contexts. The castle is a nearby factory, the soldiers get lost in the dream's birch woods one night, and the women underscore Berger's conflict between his romantic, medieval ideal of love and his obsession with sex.

Fabian Eder's lensing and Maria Homolkova's editing enhance Murnberger's vision in scenes where daydreams melt in and out of reality. The 33-year-old director's previous feature, "Heaven or Hell," racked up a handful of international awards in 1990-91.

Camera (color, B&W) , Fabian Eder; editor, Maria Homolkova; music, Robert Stiegler, Mischa Krausz; production design, Renate Martin, Andreas Donhauser; costume design, Thomas Olah; sound, Reinhold Kaiser. Reviewed at Vienna Film Festival, Oct. 26, 1994. Running time: 115 MIN.

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