THE TIN DRUM (1979) (B-minus) - Where to begin with this Nazi-era tale of a boy who constantly bangs on his toy drum, can shatter glass with his shrieks and has willed himself to never grow taller over the movie's course of two decades. It has one foot in the child-horror films of the 1970s and the other in the surreal mind-fucks from the likes of Alejandro Jodorowsky and Guy Maddin.
The 2-hour 42-minute epic from Volker Schloendorf, which was a Cannes favorite in 1979, centers around young Oskar, who lives with his parents in the Free City of Danzig, between Germany and Poland, and who is gifted with a child's toy drum at age 3. Oskar does not want to physically grow up, so he flings himself down the cellar stairs, which, in miraculous movie terms, stunts his growth forever. (The actor playing Oskar, David Bennent, was about 12 at the time of filming and was small for his age, though he does not track as a 3-year-old, but more like 6 or 7.)
If you can get over that major distraction, then you can hang on for the Third Reich horrors and black humor that propels this inspired narrative. The opening scene involves the conception of Oskar's mother, Agnes, when his grandmother, out harvesting potatoes in a field, stashes a Polish petty criminal under her billowing skirts to hide him from the pursuit of a pair of bumbling soldiers. It is from that improbable act of nature that all else flows.
The plot swerves all over the place. Oskar will age but not grow, so we will see him at age 16 seducing the maid that his father hired after Oskar's mother dies. Bennent was definitely placed in some awkward situations for a prepubescent actor, and that might bother some viewers. At one point Oskar catches his father screwing the maid and physically blocks his dad from pulling out before ejaculating inside her. Eventually, the child actor will be face first in the bush of a naked woman (whose husband will be accused of abusing Hitler Youth boys).
Oskar also will befriend the little people of the traveling circus, eventually showing off his glass-shattering abilities for German troops. Polish resistance forces make a valiant stand to defend a post office. The sweep of history carries through to the end of World War II, and thus a full reckoning between the Germans and Poles. All of it is seen through the wide eyes of that little boy.
Some of the performances are key to grounding this in somewhat of a believable cinematic production. Angela Winkler is heart-breaking as Oskar's mother, who suffers from an abusive husband and longs to be with her cousin, Jan, who could be Oskar's biological father. And Katharina Thalbach has a powerful presence as Maria, the young maid who is forced to marry Oskar's father.
I will say that I might have rolled my eyes a few times and laughed in the wrong places, but I was never bored. If you swallow the central conceit and rein in your expectations, you might agree that Schloendorf created a howling anti-war tract. Oskar's refusal to grow up is rooted in his observation of the cruelty carried out by adults, in both war and domestic relations. He doesn't want to be a part of the world as it is, so he creates his own reality. He pounds away on his drum -- really a series of them, because he tends to wear them out -- to drown out the horrors around him. That's one way of coping under an autocratic rule. If you can't shriek, what can you do?
* - Holy Crap is an occasional series about unique films, cutting a wide swath from brilliant to awful. Check out previous entries here.
BONUS TRACK
Our (unrelated) title track, which a local radio rascal in Chicago used to spin as his outro at the end of Friday's show (apparently it was done in L.A. too). It's an infectious improbable '80s hit from Todd Rundgren:
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