carnivalofsouls

Borowczyk remains one of the least appreciated filmmakers of his era, inarguably an auteur, but one so erratic and unusual that he remains cherished only by a handful of critics for his early surrealist work and by cult movie devotees for his later, sexually-explicit films. While from the mid-seventies onward his films would range from the good (Behind Convent Walls, The Story of Sin) to the not-so-good (The Art of Love, Immoral Tales, etc), his film-making legacy rests with the bizarre La Bete, which unfortunately belongs to the latter category. However it is his early films (both animated and live action) that are undoubtedly Borowczyk's key works – Blanche, for instance, is one of the finest films ever made, while Goto the Island of Love is almost as good – and in many ways these films set up the themes that would be prevalent throughout much of his subsequent work, most importantly that sex is constantly linked with guilt, persecution and death.

This is perhaps why La Marge is so unjustly obscure. The casting of Kristel (not to mention the film's alternate title Emmanuelle '77) suggests the film was tailored to appeal to the softcore market, yet the emphatically gloomy atmosphere and subject matter, which includes death, adultery and suicide, is significantly at odds with this. Compared to the other Borowczyk films of this period, with perhaps the exception of The Story of Sin, La Marge is surprisingly restrained. The film works because of its minimalism and ambiguity – the dialogue is sparse, presumably because of the actors' inability to speak French, and their character motivation is vague to say the least. It is never made clear why Sigimond is driven to cheat on his seemingly perfect wife, though it is perhaps no coincidence that Diana more than slightly resembles her. Borowczyk as usual fills the movie with visual motifs, using reflective surfaces to signify the duality of Sigimond's life, and lingering, unerotic shots of female genitalia to convey what is at the core of his actions and desires, and what is, in essence, being a Borowczyk film, Sigimond's prison.

The film is beautifully photographed, full of the director's obtuse trademark framing, and, something rather unusual for Borowczyk, features a remarkable period soundtrack, from the first Kristel/Dallesandro sex scene played out to 10CC's I'm Not in Love to the stunning blowjob sequence set to Pink Floyd, and an incredible climax that employs Elton John's Funeral For a Friend. While La Marge is distinctively a Borowczyk film in many respects, it also possesses a sombreness and maturity that was rare for the director, for despite the occasional surreal moment (a dwarf watching television, a hotel maid examining her breasts in the mirror, a deranged old woman watching sex through a keyhole), it is primarily a straightforward examination of two doomed characters unable to escape the prisons of their existence. Fans of the director's early work may find the film overly conventional, while devotees of his later period may be disappointed by how restrained it is, yet La Marge is an unfairly neglected film, one of the director's most enduring and haunting works.

The most unusual entry in the AFT series was no doubt one of the least successful. Though it attempted to make the source material more cinematic through the use of flashy visuals and edits (think a somnambulistic Ken Russell circa Tommy and Listzomania), this only helped to date a production that, considering the music at its centre, had no right to be dated. Jacques Brel was a brilliant French songwriter and while his music found its way into the English and American pop charts thanks to various bastardizations (stand up Rod McKuen and Terry Jacks), his acerbic lyrical style and gallows humour were always lost in the translation. The intention of the off-Broadway musical was to no doubt make amends for this and to introduce an English-speaking audience to some of the finest songs ever written, yet the power of the songs, no matter how great they are, are reliant on the three performers, who, at least in this incarnation, are simply not up to scratch. While Elly Stone's shrill voice does not help matters, the worst culprit is Mort Shuman.

Shuman, a legendary Brill Building songwriter, was responsible for the English translation of Brel's songs and many will know that these translations were scattered across Scott Walker's astonishing first four solo albums of the late sixties. And herein lays Shuman's greatest misstep, as he, coincidentally or not, takes on the task of covering the same songs as Walker. Yet not only does Shuman lack Walker's powerful voice, he also manages to deliver the tunes in a misguided and frequently irritating fashion. Compare his pitiful rendition of Mathilde to the version on Walker's debut, and one will see how crucial the delivery of Brel's songs are to their power, Walker brilliantly straddles an intense line between ecstasy and despair, as compared to Shuman, who lifelessly pouts his way through the song.

Only Joe Masiell's voice seems suited to the material and though many of his scenes are highlights, the undoubted triumph is Brel's haunted, French rendition of If You Go Away, where in a single, deeply moving take, the great man himself, approaching his death in 1978, tears a hole in the film that it has no chance of recovering from. If there is a single reason to view the film, it is for this, otherwise one is recommended to save your cash and purchase Brel's own recordings or the compilation Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel.

Alex Cox will always be remembered for the astonishing one-two punch of 'Repo Man' and 'Sid and Nancy', yet his finest achievement was the daring, career-destroying 'Walker'. As if being exiled from the studio system wasn't enough, Cox then made the diabolically awful 'Straight To Hell' to seemingly bury any credibility he may have had left. 'The Winner' represents yet another oddity from Cox's years in the indie wilderness, but perhaps has the highest curio factor due to its eyebrow-raising ensemble cast. Yet what makes 'The Winner', ultimately, a loser, is in all fairness not attributed to Cox but rather its unimpressive, derivative, post-Tarantino screenplay (allegedly adapted from a play, presumably off-off-off-off Broadway). Cox and the cast struggle with its uneven tone and, despite Frank Whaley scoring in a hilariously slimy role, the unfunny nature of the script is barely able to justify the film's incessant stylistic zaniness. While it does work in small doses (an effective opening and a memorably odd ending), it simply isn't enjoyable enough to even warrant minor cult status. That said, it is at least a slight cut above the other interminable 'Pulp Fiction' clones that plagued the mid-to-late nineties. But what sort of endorsement is that?