John Alton would be proud of much of The Man From London—who needs story when everything can be expressed in opaque pools of light and the void of darkest, deepest shadow? But The Big Combo never had an opening like Béla Tarr’s new film, where from a dock worker’s panoptical switching tower one can see crimes hatched, carried out, and foiled, the world one big noir production produced right there in front of the fogged windows, under the searchlight glare and on the steps of the abyss of the night sea, all for one’s amusement. Maloin (Miroslav Krobot) seems to be able to see all, but understanding is another matter. Perhaps that is why Tarr and co-writer László Krasznahorkai’s adaptation of Georges Simenon’s novel seems stripped down at best and flaccid and vague at worse; a story, above all a moral one, where simple actions are only simple in conception (murders, stolen money), and once one takes the time to actually do something (for duration is all in Tarr’s films) what was originally conceived seems to have dissipated into the dense air.

Isn’t this what we used to praise classical Hollywood auteurs for, shaping a written material into a personal vision, a mise-en-scčne as much stylistic and thematic as it is moral? That is what Tarr has done here, and if the core of the film seems hollow, thin, and strangely vacuous—sporadically populated and hazily set in an anonymous port, this film will not be burdened with the interpretations of national allegory Tarr’s last two features were burdened with—one of the benefits is seeing the director handling uninspired material with his personality intact. Indeed, when Maloin descends from his glass booth at the docks or his tower apartment out of curiosity or ambition, or a million other movie excuses for a lumpen worker to involve himself in the world outside his humdrum routine (with Tilda Swinton as his wife and Sátántangó's poor cat girl Erika Bók all grown up and melancholy as his daughter), for all the noir hoariness and opaque psychology of this set-up Tarr's moral universe and aesthetic might may be all that is left.

Though this unreal port town that has more in common with Sternberg’s purgatory-like, nebulous The Docks of New York than the decrepit, socially-grounded locales of Tarr’s past work, one still finds Tarr’s adherence to realism in the film, that of daily routine and life’s dullness, of walks too and from routine places, of people so deeply settled in their drudgery as to sometimes produce dark, deadpan comedy but more often inspire contempt and amorality. As shadowy, interchangeable Englishmen show up in port to try to trace a briefcase of money, Maloin decides to leave his high ground for a taste of something different, perhaps a better, easier life. Like George Bancroft in Sternberg’s nighttime, barroom ode to spending a lifetime in transient spaces, Maloin is inextricably drawn to the allure of a finalizing action on dry land that will make everything sweet and alright, an allure that forces him to take actions he hadn’t contemplated.

One must admit that Tarr is one of those directors who when describing his films one must describe his style. In The Man From London, when character is minimalized to presence and a handful of craggy, amazing close-ups, and the story recedes to the point where only through a single character's untrustworthy monologue do we have an inkling of what has occurred deep in the shadows of long shots and under the hooded eyes of our probably ignorant protagonist, Tarr's aesthetic moves more to the forefront than ever with so little to work with. Even at a leisurely two hours there seems little else in this film beyond Maloin’s reluctant, plodding attempt at something beyond routine observation and miserablism, and Tarr’s gorgeously moving camera. The magic is all here, just ascribed to nothing but a ditty: the opening tracking shot that courses back and forth inside the switching booth to follow the mysterious journey of the newly arrived briefcase; the minor crash of waves to foreground the very instant of Maloin’s involvement; gliding dolly shots that start facing the back of Maloin drinking at his bar and end up as a close-up of another patron in the backroom of the establishment; a rare confrontation of inky, chiaroscuro close-ups between Maloin and the English inspector (an excellently calm István Lénárt, reminiscent of Max von Sydow) as the net closes; those rare moments of Tarr’s black comedy, from Mihály Vig’s incessant accordion soundtrack to a spare handful of Tarr regulars turning up in the local bar; and finally something I don’t think I have ever seen from this director, namely, sad still-lives, as the camera patiently holds a shot and the human characters walk out of frame we are left with the morning sunlight spilling over a single chair holding Maloin’s work clothes and boots, or the empty little desk that contains a single box of savings and a notepad. Can one complain about such beauty? Perhaps one can say that it is hanging on but a narrative excuse, a whisper of Tarr’s cinematic world expressed far richer and deeper in better films. This may be true, but a minor film by a master is a master’s film regardless of size and scope; The Man From London may not be Béla Tarr’s best but it certainly is Béla Tarr’s, which makes it a wonder in and of itself.