I checked out "The Draughtsman's Contract," directed by Peter Greenaway, which was Anne Lambert's last major film role before going on to a lot of TV work. She was about as interesting and memorable as a blank piece of notebook paper.
That also leaves me 0-2 on Peter Greenaway films. I saw "The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover" years ago and thought it stunk. Has anyone enjoyed one of his movies? Is there something I'm missing?
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Ug. I saw "The Cook." I thought it was a revolting piece of misogynist tripe masquerading as a "controversial" art film. That was what I thought then, even BEFORE I had made up my mind to never again watch another movie that raped and shit on women for entertainment.
(oh, and my apologies to anyone who liked it ... if you did like it, please tell me what you liked about it, because I will readily admit that I probably overlooked some good qualities).
Never saw that one. Somehow it seemed like the sort of picture that a bunch of people were running around claiming to like because they didn’t want to be thought unhip for not liking it. Never seemed worth the bother.
I saw “Prospero’s Books” when it came out. My memory is mainly of liking it well enough at the time although I couldn’t tell you much about it anymore.
Dude! Did we see "Prospero's Books" together at Liberty Hall? All I remember about it is that it was an adaptation of Shakespeare's "The Tempest," which I love, although I don't remember liking the movie. And I remember that there was a little castrato-type kid who had a really, really high voice. Was he Puck?
Does anyone remember the Paul Mazursky film "Tempest" with John Cassavettes and Gena Rowlands (I love her!) and Susan Sarandon? Same timeless story, circa early 1980s.
Oooh ... I might like a "Tempest" story. Maybe I'll give him one more try.
And, don't forget! "The Tempest" also has a temptress named MIRANDA!
cl, David Thomson has some very on-the-money things to say about Peter Greenaway in that book I want everyone to have — mainly about how his art film aesthetic is cold and sterile and devoid of humanity. Of "The Cook," he says: The celebration of form only made the cruelty in the material more excruciating, and more vacant.
Nicely said, I think.
And he compares Greenaway, whom he calls an "authentic misanthrope," to David Lynch but says he lacks Lynch's humanity.
He says "Prospero's Books" was an unkindness not just to Shakespeare but to John Gielgud, too.
And he also says this, which I find really interesting: Greenaway is a test case in the question as to whether cinema can really be as solitary as art or literature. Or is there not an inevitable, maudlin, melodramatic sense of the crowd as soon as one throws light on a wall?
I'm not totally certain what he's saying, but I think it has something to do with our having fundamentally different expectations of film — maybe that seeing other human beings living and breathing on screen is more deeply engaging than seeing them represented in literature or sculpture or painting or photography. Some semblance of warmth or humanity is a condition for our staying interested. The filmmaker simply can't ignore audience expectations the way a "still" artist can. Film is inherently communal.
"The celebration of form only made the cruelty in the material more excruciating, and more vacant."
I think that also sums up the abyss between audience expectation and actual delivery in Greenaway's work.
I'm a little touchy about the comparison to David Lynch. Felllini might be a better match -- he also uses surrealism to tell stories about characters that I didn't care about ("Satyricon," what I recall of "La Dolce Vita," which I'm going to rewatch.) Lynch also uses surreal elements to inspire laughter or sympathy or curiosity or fear, all from the heart, whereas Greenaway's agenda is to repulse.
In "Draughtsman," Greenaway used a nude actor painted in green to represent a garden statue, and he ran around giggling at the characters. The statue's contempt for the characters resembles the way Greenaway treats them -- like he's a naughty schoolboy getting away with deceit and degradation and sexual humiliation, and cowed audiences think they ought to call his work art. He doesn't like his characters, and they don't like each other or themselves.
Lynch isn't even in the same ballpark for his cinematic and storytelling skills.
Oh, I like this, too: "Greenaway is a test case in the question as to whether cinema can really be as solitary as art or literature."
I think art might or might not tell a story, but a film should. I'm trying to think of exceptions to this ....
(Is it a moot point if Greenaway's excretions don't count as art?)
(Is it a moot point if Greenaway's excretions don't count as art?)
I'd say so, hon.
In the Lynch comparison, Greenaway cpmes off very poorly.
Just think about "Mulholland Drive" and what a feat it was for Lynch to make those characters likeable. It's really remarkable the human warmth he's able to evoke with his bizarre subject matter. In anyone else's hands, that film would have come off as a cold-hearted freak show.
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