Multiple award-winning anime short-film, Koji Yamamura’s Franz Kafka’s A Country Doctor, is an interpretation of Kafka’s short story by the same name. The film explores the frustration of a writer confronting a creative block, as interruptions from the world around keep pouring in, only to make him wonder what it is that his protagonist transforms into when he wakes up. Peter Capaldi’s Academy award winning short-film, Franz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life, begins where writer Kafka started his deliciously dark tale of a man’s metamorphosis into an insect - on a piece of paper. Not only is the film the filmmaker’s personal favourite, but over the years has also been touted as a cinematic masterpiece by critics.įranz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life (1993) Here are five outstanding adaptations of Kafka’s works one must watch:īased on Franz Kafka’s novel of the same name, this 1962 film by director Orson Welles follows the story of a bureaucrat who is arrested and persecuted for a crime that is neither mentioned to the protagonist nor to the viewer.
Several filmmakers have been inspired by Kafka’s stories, thereby creating some of the most visually stunning and eccentric works of cinema known to the world. Alienation, existentialism, absurdity, all of it comes together in Kafka’s works to form a heady, surreal cocktail of words and imageries. Nothing was ever quite as weird or experimental as Wonderful Life which announced Capaldi as not only a fine actor but a hugely talented director.Literary legend, Franz Kafka, has left generations of readers astounded with his fantastical stories, a style that has received its own special name – ‘Kafkaesque’. The other stars are cinematographer Simon Maggs, designer John Beard and costume designer Hazel Pethig who make the most of a meagre budget, helping Capaldi sell the illusion of a man trapped in a bleak and desolate existence where hope and redemption is, literally, just around the corner.īetween Franz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life and taking on the mantle of The Doctor, Capaldi directed Strictly Sinatra (2001), A Portrait of Scotland (2009) and Born to be King (2013), but his masterpiece remains The Cricklewood Greats (2012), a short television film that spoofs the history of British cinema in magnificent style. Grant carries most of the film and is on top form as the increasingly frazzled Kafka. Very weird and very funny, Franz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life is every bit as bizarre as you might imagine but there’s plenty of humour thanks to the game cast (even Stott’s creepy knife sharpener is strangely amusing and turns out to be rather likable) and Kafka’s daft imaginings of what Samsa has turned into. It’s the only real point at which Capaldi’s film touches It’s a Wonderful Life but it’s hard to imagine any parallel universe where Capra’s film ends with a giant spider, its body a human head, lying on a bed belting out a rendition of Ah! Sweet Mystery of Life from Rida Johnson Young and Victor Herbert’s operetta Naughty Marietta. He’s started work on his 1915 novella Die Verwandlung ( The Metamorphosis) but so far all he’s got is “As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic…” Gigantic what? Wracked by self-doubt and in dire need of inspiration, Kafka is driven to further distraction by the music from the party being thrown by downstairs neighbour Miss Cicely (Elaine Collins), a creepy knife sharpener, Woland (Ken Stott) prowling the corridor outside his room in search of his “little friend” and Frau Bunofsky (Phyllis Logan) who turns up at his door trying to sell him a giant fly costume.Īfter a couple of false starts (“…transforms into a gigantic… banana? Kangaroo?”) Kafka has his George Bailey moment when he realises that he has more friends that care about him than he ever imagined. Grant stars as Kafka, trapped alone in his lodgings as Christmas approaches, battling with writer’s block. But it’s the telling of the joke that makes the film so much fun.
In truth Franz Kafka’s It’s a Wonderful Life is a rather slight joke, and has precious little to do with Frank Capra’s enduring Christmas favourite – it came about when Capaldi’s wife got the two names mixed up in conversation. First time out, he bagged himself both a BAFTA for Best Short Film and the Academy Award equivalent (tying with Peggy Rajski’s Trevor for the latter.) Long before he took over the keys to the TARDIS, and even before he launched all those foul-mouthed tirades of abuse as permanently angry political “enforcer” Malcolm Tucker in The Thick of It (2005-2012), actor Peter Capaldi tried his hand at writing and directing.
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