Nicolas Roeg

[Robin Davies]

Just received this large coffee-table book about Don't Look Now.
https://dontlooknowbook.com/

[Stefan]

This book looks terrific, thanks for the hint.
One may wonder why a publisher still, in this day and age, has the sense of adventure to bring something like this out. What is the circulation figure - 500? Anyway, hats off!

[MichaelB]

My order number was #197, for what that's worth.

An easy impulse purchase - I'm greatly looking forward to the look on my wife's face as it segues from absolute horror that I've had the temerity to introduce another large book into the house to gleeful realisation that it has a ton of pictures of one of her favourite actors to perve over.

(With incredible timing, our local cinema is showing the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers the night before this Sunday's wedding anniversary as a Halloween treat. Amazingly, given not just Donald Sutherland but also the young Jeff Goldblum, she's never seen it.)

[Stefan]

@MichaelB: Hahaha! I can figure the whole scene ...
When Gene Hackman died this year my woman was thoroughly hit. A few days after I made the suggestion to watch Roeg's "Eureka", which she had not seen, while introducing it as a "tough one". She backed away - which might be all for the better. Sutherland's death in "Don't Look Now" is harsh, the one of Hackman in "Eureka" is ridiculously gross. I still wonder why Roeg chose that option.

[JSC]

I still wonder why Roeg chose that option.

Hackman's character is based on Harry Oakes and the circumstances surrounding his murder (the film
sticks pretty close to the established (if grisly) facts of his demise).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Oakes

[MichaelB]

Yes, it was pretty much a reconstruction of the Oakes murder, right down to the feathers.

[Robin Davies]

Re the Don't Look Now book, I like the fact that there seems to be a mysterious hooded figure lurking in the background of the shot on page 295.
I'm also intrigued by the wildly contradictory accounts of the casting of Adelina Poerio on page 323.

[Stefan]

Wow, your infos about the reconstruction of the Harry Oates murder in "Eureka" is definitely new to me. And I thought to "know" this film since 1988 (when it came out on video in Germany). I am ... dumbstruck.
But however ... one could still raise the question whether the detailed slaughtering of Hackman/McCann/"Oakes" has any counterpart value in and for the film. Or if it is just gratuitous berserk movie violence.

[JSC]

Well, I suppose it leads to the larger question of gratuitous violence in movies in general (which has already filled
reams of printed pages already so I won't go there), but I suppose Roeg might have thought that the murder (which
seemed so utterly bizarre and random) could provide a grotesque visual counterpoint to the sequence where McCann
discovers the gold seam.

[Stefan]

That's an interesting point. The whole film is exuberant and baroque anyway. It cherishes the extremes (the first 15 minutes alone!). "Don't Look Now" is a piano etude in subtlety by comparison.

[MichaelB]

But however ... one could still raise the question whether the detailed slaughtering of Hackman/McCann/"Oakes" has any counterpart value in and for the film. Or if it is just gratuitous berserk movie violence.

It's berserk because it was berserk - but I don't see how it's "gratuitous"; how can what by all accounts is a very accurate reconstruction of how Harry Oakes met his end be the least bit gratuitous in a film that's openly based on Oakes' life and death (as it makes explicit in the credited source, the book Who Killed Harry Oakes?). What would censoring this have achieved, apart from looking like a cop-out to those familiar with the Oakes story?

[JSC]

I suppose it's not so much a question of censoring, but whether or not showing the actual murder in all it's
detail is artistically justfied within the context of the film. Personally, I have no issue with the scene (despite
it's graphic detail). If Roeg had staged the scene so that we only see the aftermath (i.e. someone walks in
and discovers the body) it probably would have been just as horrific, but then we'd have to have someone
(who for the sake of brevity, I like to call Monsieur Exposition) have to explain it all to someone, including
the feathers.

[Stefan]

Exactly, JSC. "If you stare into the abyss for too long [or too closely], the abyss stares back at you" - filmic representation of a horrific event should never be a duplication, it's as simple as that.

[MichaelB]

It really, really isn't, and I think you're letting clear personal squeamishness override common sense.

Should Andrzej Wajda's Katyń have ended with a discreet fadeout? I daresay Wajda would have found that easier, given that he was effectively restaging his own father's real-life murder - but even though we've already sat through two hours or so of detailed discussion about the aftermath of the massacre, nothing prepares you for its horrifically low-tech, agonisingly protracted staging, which has all the more impact for coming at the end of the film rather than within the first half-hour (where it belongs chronologically).

In fact, to echo JSC's final point, Katyń has lots of Monsieur (and Madame) Expositions popping up throughout the film, offering perspective from multiple angles - but these multiple viewpoints serve to blur the events, which Wajda then brings back into unignorably sharp focus.

[JSC]

I don't believe that a personal reaction necessarily precludes common sense. But then, Eureka is not a docudrama or a mere
reconstruction of events but is in essence, a fictional story that uses real-life events as a basis for artistic expression. If one feels
that the murder scene is unnecessarily violent, that is an equally valid opinion as saying that it's artistically justified.

Katyń might be a bit of an extreme example (although I think it's a powerful film and one of Wajda's finest acheivements).
But then, Nuit et brouillard and Shoah are also powerful films. Sometimes it's what isn't shown that leaves an indeilable
mark on the mind. For example I always find the murders in Seven (of which we see only the aftermath) to be far more
disturbing than if David Fincher had shown each one in all it's graphic detail.

Then again, for me it's never either/or... it's whether or not it serves the need of the overall film.

[Mr Sausage]

The arguments here are very moralizing. From claiming that violence on film needs special justification (and why ever would that be?) to implying that reconstructing historical violence is tantamount to recommitting it. This isn’t only personal squeamishness, but a moralistic justification for said squeamishness, as tho’ some wrong had been committed. But who would be the victims of said wrong? Us the viewer? How so? And if we are, then aren’t we just claiming that media is a corrupting influence? That puts us squarely within censorship logic.

People used to attend drawing and quarterings for fun. I think we’ll be ok.

[domino harvey]

Might also be worth reading our earlier discussion on the ethics of Cinematic Violence

[JSC]

From claiming that violence on film needs special justification (and why ever would that be?) to implying that reconstructing historical violence is tantamount to recommitting it.

I wasn't saying that violence needs special justification, but merely asking the question of whether it services or weakens
the intent of a film. Also, I did not say that reconstructing historical violence is somehow the equivalent of recommitting
a real life atrocity. I was simply talking about representation and what it means within the context of a film.

[Mr Sausage]

Stefan said the latter.

The former is implicit in your demand for ‘artistic justification’, which is just another way of saying a film needs to earn the right to show violence, like it must somehow be artistically inevitable, a teleology of aesthetic violence.

If we’re not being moralistic about violence, we don’t demand a film justify it, artistically or otherwise, because justification presumes a significant potential for wrong. There’s a reason why people demand things like violence and nudity be “justified” but not, say, scope framing. With the latter peoplejust use everyday language like ‘I don’t know why they bothered’.

[JSC]

I probably chose the word poorly. I realize that 'justification' can come across as a loaded word. It wasn't
my intention to frame it as a some kind of moral demand. Again, to merely ask the question. Not make a
definitive statement.

[Mr Sausage]

What’s the question then? Whether Eureka’s violence is unsuited to the story or the style or…?

Nicolas Roeg is usually upfront and unflinching. Withholding the details of a historical crime would be uncharacteristically demure, no? Personally I think it’s impressive that in the course of making a serious biographical drama Roeg was able to outdo most exploitation films at their own game, and even then only by sticking to the historical facts.

[Stefan]

Last but not least, one question should not be left untouched in this discussion, namely whether a film is actually good or not. In my opinion - and I'm sure I'm not alone in this - "Don't Look Now" is and has been and always will be totally GREAT, but "Eureka" not so much.
Nevertheless, “Eureka,” as a failed experiment, is more interesting precisely because it is “halfway good.” Meaning, it keeps nagging on you. I for one must have seen that thing some 30 times over the years and it ALWAYS leaves me "unsatisfied" - I say this with a peevish smile -, and that's why I love the film, even though I will never like it. And THIS is an achievement on Roeg's part!

[MichaelB]

My problem with Eureka is what happens after the murder, not the murder itself. In fact, the murder itself is quintessential Roeg (just as the discovery of the gold was in the first act), and looked set to herald an equally remarkable final act - but then the film just gets bogged down in an interminable and most un-Roeg-like courtroom drama, from which it never recovers.

[Stefan]

Yes, MichaelB, you are totally right here. The courtroom drama at the end is a piss-take on everything that has gone on before in the film.

[MichaelB]

My order number was #197, for what that's worth.

An easy impulse purchase - I'm greatly looking forward to the look on my wife's face as it segues from absolute horror that I've had the temerity to introduce another large book into the house to gleeful realisation that it has a ton of pictures of one of her favourite actors to perve over.

...and it turned up exactly 48 hours after I ordered it.

A casual flick through it suggests it was well worth the money - it feels expensive, which is just as it should be.