Format: DVD
Poreklo: Strani
Žanr: Triler

Roman Polanski - The Ninth Gate / Deveta kapija

Девета капија је фанцуско-шпанско-амерички трилер који је режирао и продуцирао Роман Полански. Филм говори о трговини ретким књигама, када дилер раритетима Дин Корсо (тумачи га Џони Деп) бива унајмљен од стране бибилиофила Бориса Балкана да провери књигу из 17. века Девет капија краљевства сенки, и он креће на пут. За ту књигу се тврди да ју је написао сам ђаво, а на свету постоје још две копије, у Паризу и Толеду. Девет капија је измишљена књига, али је базирана на Hypnerotomachia Poliphili.

Филм је базиран на књизи из 1993. The Club Dumas коју је написао Артуро Перез-Реверте. Премијера је била у Сан Себастијану 25. августа 1999, месец дана пре 47. Међународног филмског фестивала у Сан Себастијану. Ипак, у Северној Америци, филм није успео на финансијском плану, а и критика га је слабо примила. Филм је имао буџет од 38 милиона долара, а широм света зарадио је 58,4 милиона.

Сниман је у Француској, Португалу и Шпанији током лета 1998. Током снимања Џони Деп је упознао Ванесу Парадис, своју дугогодишњу девојку

The Ninth Gate is a 1999 French-Spanish-American thriller film directed, produced, and co-written by Roman Polanski. The film is loosely based upon Arturo Pérez-Reverte`s 1993 novel The Club Dumas. The plot involves the search for a rare, ancient book that purportedly contains the secret to magically summoning the Devil. The premiere showing was at San Sebastián, Spain, on 25 August 1999, a month before the 47th San Sebastian International Film Festival. It failed critically and commercially in North America; reviewers claimed it was a lesser effort than Rosemary`s Baby (1968), Polanski`s most well known supernatural film. Nonetheless, The Ninth Gate earned a worldwide gross of $58.4 million against a $38 million budget.

Directed by Roman Polanski
Produced by Roman Polanski
Screenplay by Roman Polanski
John Brownjohn
Enrique Urbizu
Based on The Club Dumas
by Arturo Pérez-Reverte
Starring Johnny Depp
Lena Olin
Frank Langella
James Russo
Jack Taylor
Emmanuelle Seigner
Music by Wojciech Kilar
Cinematography Darius Khondji
Edited by Hervé de Luze
Production
company Canal+
Distributed by Bac Films (France)
Araba Films (Spain)
Artisan Entertainment (US)
Release date(s) August 25, 1999 (worldwide)
March 10, 2000 (US)
Running time 133 minutes
Country France
Spain
United States
Language English
French
Spanish
Portuguese
Latin

Dean Corso is a New York City rare book dealer motivated solely by financial gain. Wealthy book collector Boris Balkan has recently acquired a copy of The Nine Gates of the Kingdom of Shadows by seventeenth-century author Aristide Torchia, one of only three copies known to exist. According to legend, the book is Torchia`s adaptation of an older book written by the Devil himself and purportedly contains the means to ritualistically summon the Devil and, through him, acquire invincibility and immortality. Balkan believes two of the copies are forgeries. He hires Corso to authenticate all three copies, and acquire the legitimate copy by any means necessary.

Balkan`s copy of The Nine Gates had previously belonged to bibliophile Andrew Telfer, who committed suicide soon after selling the book to Balkan. Telfer`s widow Liana wants the book back, as Telfer originally bought the book for her. Liana seduces Corso, but she fails to re-acquire her book. Meanwhile, Corso`s business partner, Bernie, with whom Corso had hidden the book, is murdered; his corpse is posed in imitation of an engraving in The Nine Gates.

Corso travels to Toledo, Spain, where the Ceniza brothers, book restorers, show him that three of the book`s engravings are signed `LCF`, which Corso understands to mean that Lucifer himself designed and cut them. Corso goes by train to Sintra, Portugal, to compare Victor Fargas` copy of The Nine Gates to Balkan`s. To his surprise, Corso discovers that the signature `LCF` is found in three different engravings in the Fargas copy, which vary in detail from their counterparts in the Balkan copy. The next morning a mysterious young woman (aka., the Girl) who appears to have been shadowing Corso since Balkan hired him, awakens Corso and leads him to Fargas` house where he finds the old man murdered and the engravings ripped out of his copy of The Nine Gates.

In Paris, Corso visits the Baroness Kessler, the owner of the third copy of the book. The Baroness initially refuses any contact with Corso once she realizes who his employer is, but Corso returns and intrigues Kessler with evidence that the engravings differ among the three copies. Gaining access to Kessler`s copy, he finds the `LCF` on three different engravings, which are also slightly different from their counterparts in the two other copies. Later, Kessler is killed, and the Girl rescues Corso from Liana`s bodyguard. Corso believes that each copy of The Nine Gates is genuine but that each contains deliberately falsified images, requiring possession of all three copies to make sense of the ritual. Liana steals Balkan`s copy from Corso`s hotel room. He follows her to a mansion and witnesses her using the book in a Satanist ceremony. Balkan suddenly interrupts the ceremony, kills Liana, takes the engraving pages and his own intact copy, and then flees.

Corso pursues Balkan to a remote castle, which was depicted in one of the engravings, and in a postcard that Corso found in Kessler`s copy, and finds Balkan preparing to open the Nine Gates. After a struggle, Balkan traps Corso in a hole in the floor, immobilizing him and allowing Balkan to perform his summoning ritual unmolested but with Corso as a `witness`. After arranging the engravings on an makeshift altar, in a mixed order, Balkan begins reciting a series of phrases related to each of the nine engravings. The phrases refer, poetically, to certain characters` actions throughout the film which make up the summoning ritual. Balkan then douses the floor and himself with gasoline and sets it alight, believing himself to be immune to the flames. Balkan`s invocation appears to fail, and Balkan begins screaming in agony as his body burns. Corso frees himself and spares Balkan an agonizing death by shooting him. He then escapes the fire.

Outside the building, the Girl appears to Corso and then has sex with him by the light of the burning castle. She tells him that Balkan failed because the ninth engraving he had used, despite being signed `LCF,` was a forgery. Corso, following her directions, returns to the Ceniza brothers` shop. Upon arriving, he finds the store gone and the last piece of furniture being removed, from the top of which falls the authentic ninth engraving with a very different image than the forgery. On it, there is a likeness of the mystery girl. With the last engraving in hand, Corso returns to the castle it depicts and, having apparently performed all the ritual requirements, crosses the threshold of the Ninth Gate.