Al's Birthday Review: Stalker

Bob here. Another year come and gone. No jokes about it this time...I'm just thankful we made it, and I could experience this yearly tradition again. Sorry - I'll leave the somber reflection behind, at least about my actual life. Somber reflection won't entirely go away, though, as the film Al's given me this time is Stalker.

Stalker is...a weird film to talk about. Made in 1979 in Soviet-era Russia, it was loosely - very loosely - based on the 1972 novel Roadside Picnic. The general concept in each is similar: in both, characters called "stalkers" enter an area called "the Zone" in which strange phenomena exist following some sort of event. In the novel, the Zone (of which there are actually multiple) is explicitly the result of an alien visitation. It's compared to what forest animals might think of the aftermath of a roadside picnic, thus the name. In the film, it's...less clear. There's mention of a meteorite impact, and that everyone who entered the Zone to investigate disappeared. In any case, stalkers and the Zone are consistent...as is the idea of something which can grant a wish, but is guarded by some kind of extreme danger.

From there...the film and the book diverge considerably. This isn't really a comparitive review, but just for the sake of argument, after having looked up the plot of the book, I rather wish the film had been made to follow it much more directly. That's...largely because the book seems to have bothered to have a plot in which things actually occur, where the film seems to have largely foregone that in favor of slow pans across landscapes and a heavy dose of philosophy. The former is good mood setting but far, far too lengthy. The latter is the heart of the film and actually interesting...but far too infrequent.

But let's rewind. Stalker is the story of the titular Stalker, one of a group of such people who leads people into the area called the Zone to attempt to find a Room (don't worry, there's no Tommy Wiseau) in which they can have their wish fulfilled. Stalker's wife is not pleased with him and his daughter, who he affectionately calls Monkey, is said to be deformed or cursed by the Zone's power. (There's nothing visible on the kid, but she does spend all her time bundled up. Something more obvious presents itself in the end but I'll avoid spoilers. One more minor note, though: in the book, "Monkey" makes more sense as a nickname as the kid's mutation is full body hair.)

Stalker agrees to escort a couple people, who he names Writer and Professor, into the Zone. He gets them across the police lines, though they're nearly caught and face some gunfire (don't worry, though, it's all at a really sedate pace so as to avoid any accidental excitement). Reaching the Zone, they...set about slowly, extremely slowly, wandering through it, with Stalker checking their path by chucking metal nuts wrapped in bandages around. Slowly, the story of Stalker's former teacher, who in the end went by Porcupine, is revealed - he came back from the Zone rich one day, but committed suicide a week later.

Along the way, they do a lot - and I mean a lot - of walking around ruined buildings. Occasionally, Writer or the Professor (more often Writer) expresses doubts about Stalker's leadership or disobeys him and Stalker yells at them. They also very occasionally (but at great length when it occurs) discuss philosophy, revealing more about themselves. These are definitely, definitely the movie's best moments, and honestly, if you trimmed down the film to mostly be the three discussing their varying philosophies and concepts of the Zone and its meaning, and cut like 2/3rds of the aimless near-silent wandering, this film would be awesome. Not even kidding. The philosophical discussions are genuinely fascinating and reveal a lot about the characters, and represent an interesting intersection and confrontation of faith, science, reason, logic, nihilism, and hope.

Is it just me, or do you see an angry face wearing an eyepatch on the back wall too?

That's the trouble with this film. It spends most of its runtime on the wrong part. They got caught up in the idea of having a journey, but the journey is not interesting. Actual dangers are rarely presented or even hinted at beyond Stalker's vague intimations that your every action matters in the Zone - there's just one creepy call to Writer when he goes off Stalker's path, and one weird kindasorta time loop. The rest is...at best, some vague suggestions? Mostly, it's just some dudes stumbling around in the woods or a dark ruined building for a while.

But the philosophy? The conflict of different ideals? That's excellent. Especially as the film goes on, and it gets clearer and clearer that neither Writer nor Professor are being fully honest or, perhaps, even truly know themselves, and as both begin to progressively question both Stalker and that mysterious Room to which they're headed. The varying conflicts between the Stalker and the other characters are interesting, too - the Writer's problem with him is doubt, but the Professor seems to believe but have his own stubbornness that causes problems. A little bit of weirdness towards the last stages of the journey reveals a different side of the Professor, as well.

I won't spoil where the film goes with those elements. Not so much that there ends up being much of a plot, but...where the characters end up is interesting, and is meaningful, and should you choose to go into this film despite the negativity I've heaped on parts of its construction, I'd rather you not miss out on some of the good parts by my spoiling them. Suffice to say philosophies and questions come to a head and there's some rather interesting twists in the closing forty-five minutes or so.

No, no - please, do hurry up.

Oh, yeah, by the way, this thing's over two and a half hours long. Again...it could use some trimming. It's a real shame as the central character conflicts are genuinely interesting and well performed by the three leads - it's just that those don't feel like the focus of the film. The focus appears to be the journey through the Zone, and the Zone is just...not interesting. You could literally have just had the characters pop into the Zone, find themselves right in front of the final tunnel (which features the only meaningful confrontation with the Zone's weirdness in the entire film, though even that is vague), have half their philosophical discussion there, go through the tunnel, and do the film's ending exactly the same way it was done. It'd take about an hour and would be great.

They didn't...so it's really, really dull. Just...much like Hard to Be a God, it's a really well-presented, well-acted kind of dull with great location scouting and mood-setting. But...that's still dull. I'm not asking for the film to be a rip-roaring sci-fi action adventure with danger at every turn. What I am asking is that it have the decency to recognize that perhaps it could hold itself to panning across one waterfall going through a dilapidated old building instead of three or four, and to, say, a solid three shots of Stalker tossing a bandaged-wrapped nut at a log before it figures out that, you know, the audience probably gets that he's doing that. Oh, and maybe consider having the characters discuss philosophy while they walk. Proper philosophers can multi-task. I hear Plato was famous for the way he could whip up a nice kolokythopita while he expounded on metaphysics.

Some final notes:

• There's a genuinely great visual transition in the film - the early part outside the Zone is in sepia, and the part inside the Zone is all in full color. This brings up some very interesting questions for the viewer at a couple points midway through the film, and especially towards the end, where the color / sepia shifts come in again.
• At a couple points, characters address the camera directly out of nowhere. What is it with depressing Russian films and people talking right to me?
• The three leads - Stalker, Writer, and Professor - are similar enough in appearance that in the sepia-toned bits it's actually hard to tell who is who. Writer and Professor are both balding middle-aged white guys, and Stalker is a middle-aged white guy who is not balding but has faded patches of hair that makes it look like he is when seen from a distance in sepia. Fortunately, Professor puts on a hat pretty quickly, and when we get to the full color sections, they all wear differently colored coats.
• Writer's expounding on why Porcupine actually committed suicide and what it means for the Room is a genuinely great moment in the film and the ultimate summation of his own character. Excellent work there. Stalker's reaction their journey and his thoughts towards the close of the film are terrific too, and a similarly excellent expression of his own philosophy.

I am going to go into this all a bit below, because I'd like to talk about it, but before that, I'll put in my conclusion so you don't have to scroll past spoilers.

I'm still / In a dream / Snake Eater...

Stalker is not a great film. It's a bad film that has a great film in it, fighting to get out. Its greatness is treading water in an ocean of boredom. It occasionally manages to surface for a few moments, only to get pulled under once again by more and more journey sequences that just drag on forever in silence. I'm not sure that I would recommend watching this film, but I'm not sure I can recommend avoiding it either. I guess...maybe watch it, if it interests you, but have the fast-forward button ready and use it liberally?

A film that somehow manages to be dull and interesting at the same time. There's a philosophical statement there somewhere. Happy birthday, Al.

(One last "by the way" - there's also a game based very loosely on the same novel that the film is loosely based on: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Shadow of Chernobyl. Aside from the concept of a Zone, a supposed wish granter, and someone called a Stalker, there's almost no similarities in plot between the game, the film, and the book from my understanding. The game also explicitly ties the Zone to the Chernobyl disaster, while the film and book were both created before said disaster.)

**SPOILERS**

Interested in my thoughts on the character conflicts that emerge in the final moments? I'll put them here, but do watch the film if you're going to first. (Thus the spoiler tag.)

An important revelation in the film is what happened to Porcupine. The truth appears to be that he came to the Zone with his brother, but his brother was killed by the Zone and Porcupine came out a rich man, having apparently used the Room's wish-granting magic to make it so. The characters theorize that Porcupine may have intentionally murdered his brother using the Zone (in particular, a region Stalker refers to as the "meat grinder," which must be gone through in a very particular way), and then used the Room's power to gain money.

The Writer, however, theorizes differently. He claims that Porcupine lost his brother to the Zone, but when he entered the Room to make his wish, he intended to wish for his brother to be restored. However, the Room does not grant the wish a person claims to seek, or what they ask for. It grants the innermost desires of their heart. And in Porcupine's heart, it found not a desire for his brother, but for money. Thus, Porcupine was forced to realize that his conscious desires meant nothing, and it is for this reason he ended his life. It wasn't that he wanted his brother dead, it was that he could not make his heart wish for his brother to be alive.

The Writer, confronting this idea, refuses to enter the Room, realizing that he does not know what his heart truly wishes for. This calls back to an earlier conversation in which he started to tentatively question exactly that, though he worded it more at the time as not knowing what to call what he wanted - the words, not the concept. But, confronted with the need to fear what his own heart would reveal, he refuses to face it - or, as he puts it, refuses to subject the world to that mystery.

Meanwhile, the Professor has become convinced of almost exactly the opposite: that one can control the Room's power and that it is therefore inevitable that someone would find it and use it for a great evil. He reveals the pack he has carried for the entire film in fact contains a bomb and he intends to destroy the Room to prevent that. This nicely calls back to the Professor and the Writer's central conflict with each other. The Professor believes the world can be understood and the truth discovered through science, and the Writer believes ultimately truth is the result of argument and is flexible. The Writer also has lost faith his his ability to convince others of things through writing, as revealed through an earlier piece to camera, and this factors in to his doubt of his own ability to understand his own wish. The Professor, on the other hand, believing strongly in the power of fact and proof, of course believes it entirely likely and probable that someone could know what result would come of entering into the Room - and thus, that it is a danger.

What of the Stalker? The Stalker believes in the Room as only good, believing that it chooses those to come and welcomes only those who most need it. He believes that Porcupine was punished for coming to the Room with a selfish heart and his own agenda, anathema for Stalkers, and therefore, to the others' doubts, he expresses that he never considers entering the Room and has no wish of his own. (This, by the way, is a major deviation from the novel as well, in which the Stalker's journey and personality are far, far more focused on his own wish, and actively - and fatally - deceptive to at least one escortee.) He only wants to help others and that is where he finds his joy.

In the end, the Writer's explanations convince the Professor, who disassembles and disarms his bomb. No one uses the Room.

They return to the world beyond the Zone, and the Stalker brings a dog from within with him. The experience distresses the Stalker - he has brought two men through the Zone, believing the Zone welcomed them, but neither believed in the Zone or trusted it to help them. For him the Zone is the ultimate good, an aid to all who need it...but his faith is shaken by the fact that those chosen by the Zone have rejected it, and in his words, that it did not work for them. His wife, who opposed his journey in the beginning, even seeks to offer to go herself to bring back his faith, but he refuses - not because she is unworthy, but because he now doubts as well - what, he asks, would he do if it did not work for her? He mourns the lack of belief of those he escorted, and what it means for the world if none can believe.

But interestingly, as well, we see a few moments during those closing parts where the film is once again in color. These are while the Stalker walks with his wife and daughter on a shoreline (in the view of a nuclear power plant, perhaps, from the look of things), and a final shot of his daughter demonstrating telekinesis, in pretty much the only actual effects shot in the movie. What do those mean? I'm not sure I have the answer. I don't think it means they are in the Zone...but maybe it is less about the Zone than about belonging?

For the Stalker, the Zone is belonging. The Zone is home - more than the outer world. It is vibrant to our eyes, I think, because it is life to him - it is more alive than the rest of his life. So perhaps the flashes of color in the post-Zone segment represent something of that - perhaps they are an expression of a seeking, at least, to love his own world and to seek to find life with his family, rather than only in the Zone. Or...perhaps I am wrong. The Stalker does wonder why he does not take his family into the Zone earlier. Perhaps he does. It is difficult to tell the precise sequence of events in the end (and the telekinesis shots come completely out of nowhere).

Leaving that aside...what, then, is the film's final philosophy? I do not think it makes a choice. Each of the men raises interesting points, and each argues theirs. I don't think the film outright says any are right. The Stalker's faith is wounded - but we are never actually shown he is wrong. The Writer seems to convince the Professor, and perhaps shake the Stalker - but he himself is repeatedly shaken, and even fights to protect the Professor's bomb from the Stalker at one point, even though the Professor's reasoning for wishing to destroy the Room is at odds with his own explanation. The Professor raises interesting points about the danger of a wish, but inflexibility may have robbed him of a chance for a great good, even once he discards his plan, swayed by the Writer. The Stalker's wife, too, gets a chance to philosophize, stating that a bitter happiness is better than gray, dull life, and that without the misfortunes she has experienced alongside the Stalker, there would be no hope either.

I think the film leaves it, somewhat, to you. There are reasons to think like each of the characters, and reasons to doubt them as well. The Stalker is the most clearly altruistic, and is generally treated as reliable throughout the film...but he is wrong at times as well, and as the others ask, does he really understand the nature of the Zone? Do the rules he states actually hold true? The Writer is good at expressing his views, but is a view well-expressed necessarily right? And as a point of fact, his own self-analysis is proven false by the very fact that he is able to use words to convince the Professor and shake the Stalker. It is easy to be caught up in his reasoning and lose sight of the fact that he has no direct knowledge either. As for the Professor, his reasoning similarly makes sense...a wish would be dangerous if any had access to it, without morality or good principles to rely on...but what if the Writer is right that one cannot control their wish, or the Stalker is right that the Zone chooses who approaches? True, none of them has their wishes granted and that shakes the Stalker's faith - but it also means that no evil wishes were granted, nullifying the worries of the Writer and the Professor.

In the end, none of the three leads fully sees their scenario come to pass. What would've happened if one entered the Room is left to the imagination. What would've happened if the Professor set off his bomb, as well.

I don't know that I like it that way. When you put a wish in a movie plot, shouldn't you show it? But then, that's not the point of Stalker. The point isn't the answer but the question, I think. It isn't what I'd choose for a film, but it's interesting all the same.

All told...Stalker is an interesting but dull film, as I said above. A bit of a paradox. I'm glad I watched it but at the same time I'm not sure I can really recommend it. I'm glad I watched it but I'm not glad I watched all of it.