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Salient. Official Newspaper of Victoria University of Wellington Students Association. Volume 40, No. 5. 27 March 1977

Film — Sociological stew

page 16

Film

Sociological stew

The Man who Fell to Earth

Director: Nicholas Roeg

Anyone who begins to view The Man who Fell to Earth" with a mistaken notion that he or she is in for a science fiction treat would best understand that for all the publicity given to this notion the film can be comprehended more completely on the level of social commentary.

Thomas Newton (David Bowie) arrives from another planet for a reason that is unknown. He has a human form and speaks intelligibly but is clearly an alien. Moving quickly on, he is seen to hire a lawyer (Buck Henry) to construct and manage an inevitably successful business empire based upon Newton's sophisticated and advanced technological inventions. That he needs the money is clear, but why he needs it is not told. In the course of events two other main characters are introduced. One, Dr Bryce (Rip Torn), is a cynical scientist whose predilection for screwing 18 year old students reflects back to a creative stultification; Newton hires him to work on a fuel conservation problem. The other, Mary Lou (Candy Clark), is a pretty but shallow hotel employee who becomes Newton's lover. Newton accepts or rather tolerates her at first because, like Bryce, she fails to penetrate deeper into Newton's psyche. For her he is attractive in the persona of freak. Both she and Bryce however, are alone in coming close to him; they are the only two that he trusts.

But it is the character of Newton that is intriguing. For an alien he possesses, interestingly enough, many human qualities; he is gently, nostalgic (there are constant flashbacks to his own planet) trusting, but above all vulnerable. He is impressionable in the same sense that Herzog's Kaspar Hauser was; coming into a totally new social environment he can either resist or succumb. The film plots his dissolution in this context.

He subjects himself and is subjected to the society's true culture: the multiple television screens which wall up in front of him and occasionally reflect upon his own existence his falling into a drinking problem as an escape and his ultimate undoing when his business empire is ruthlessly overtaken and turned upon him.

The film is in fact implying the responsibility of these social phenomena for what happens to Newton. This idea has its parallel on the personal level when Bryce himself discards his loyalty.

Therefore, although Newton arrives as an alien from another planet, he in fact becomes a metaphor for present western man. By participating within the limits of the age he becomes a subject of them. Thus the science fiction element provides an exotic touch and no more. What he sees in the opening shots of the film—a desert, derelict abandoned buildings—are not so much a vision of the present but a forewarning of the future; the bleakness of these scenes resembles closely the landscape of his own planet, one which provides an indication of where a progressively sophisticated world like ours will lead. And Newton? He can do little to prevent it.

Apart from the main idea, the film is full of interesting themes: movement (trains, cars, boats, rockets); time (Newton often glimpses the past); space as illusion (the table tennis room, the televisions), What director Nicholas Roeg has done is to cook up these elements as well as others in a thick and often baffling stew. Much in the film is either barely hinted at or left untold. For example, Newton's true mission is deliberately left unexplained (the members of his planet have no fuel for their spaceships and Newton arrives to get some.)

It is on the multitude of levels in which the films get entangled and the dramatic tension built up in the first half consequently dissipates during the second. One feels that Roeg has over filled his cup. The effects of this then spill out from the screen in a bewildering array of images and ideas. While he handles the fast moving sequences well, notably the flashing light love-making scene, they tend more to dazzle than enlighten. It is during the slower paces that the film tends to be more effective.

David Bowie fits well into his role as extra terrestial visitor. With the most difficult part he succeeds convincingly (it is not surprising, it is a mask he has always worn comfortably) and is well backed up by the more than able supporting cast. And in a way this really is his movie He has, at any rate, felt it important enough to cover his last two L.P.'s with stills from the film.

As a footnote it would seem that with the passing uncut of "The Man who Fell to Earth" the censors appear to be anticipating the new censorship legislation. It realises at last a mature and intelligent approach to film and in this respect it is an indication to be welcomed.

Varsity Preview

Savage Messiah

The infamous film of Ken (The Devils. The Music Lovers, Tommy, Women in Love etc) Russell.

It is a film about art—Taking the mystique away from art. For example a character says, at one stage: "You can always tell a bad artist like a bad doctor: he surrounds his work with a certain amount of hocus-pocus."

Class of '44

The sequel to The Summer of '42

Director: Paul Bogart.

A very picturesque film of group of youths graduating from their high-school to face not the terrors of war, as in Summer of '42 but those of a sequel gone suddenly hopelessly flat.

The best aspect of the film is the period detail—The cars, billboards, haircuts, songs, etc.

Goodbye Columbus

About "a decent edgy Jewish boy from New York who falls in love with a rich, tennis-playing Jewish princess from Short Hills has been made into a very funny, immensely appealing movie of suburban romance. The New York Times describes it as one of the best films of '69.

Ali MacGraw makes her debut on the screen as one of the two stars along with Richard Benjamin.