The Falls (1980) on Netflix
After the Violent Unknown Event, survivors stop aging, speak new languages and fixate on birds and flight. A directory gathers the ninety-two entries whose surnames begin with FALL.
- Netflix3.5/5
- IMDb7.1/101,843 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes80%
Trailer
Plot summary
The Violent Unknown Event leaves many survivors with a shared set of symptoms. Some fall ill in ways that look like a change toward a bird-like form. Others dream of water, sorted into categories such as Flight and Waves, and grow obsessed with birds and flight. New languages come to the survivors, and they stop aging, so only disease or injury can end their lives. A directory of these people has been compiled, and ninety-two of its entries are presented in short parts in the manner of a mock documentary, each for a surname beginning with FALL. Not every entry belongs to a person: some are deleted records or cross-references, and one biography covers the twin brothers Ipson and Pulat Fallari.
Cast
- Colin Cantlieas Narrator (voice)
- Adam Leysas Narrator
- Sheila Canfieldas Narrator
- Monica Hydeas Woman using phone
- Keith Pendleburyas Allia Fallanx
- Marcia Pendleburyas Starling Fallanx
- Martin Burrowsas Narrator
- Adejbo Nkasaggias Ardenaur Fallatter
- Serena MacBethas Narrator
- John Wilsonas Astraham Fallbute
Show all 20 cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Falls (1980)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The Falls anticipates Peter Greenaway's later films: the subject of biography 27, Propine Fallax, is a pseudonym for Cissie Colpitts, the central figure of his Drowning by Numbers (1988), and the car accident in biography 28 prefigures the one in A Zed and Two Noughts (1985).
- The Falls was Peter Greenaway's first feature-length film, arriving after many years in which the director had made only short films.
- The Falls uses clips from songs popular with the avant-garde of the time, among them Brian Eno's "Golden Hours" from Another Green World and snippets of "Jugband Blues", the last song Syd Barrett recorded with Pink Floyd.
- Michael Nyman's score for The Falls is partly based on the slow movement of Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola and Orchestra K. 364, as is his later music for Drowning by Numbers.
