The Medusa Touch - 1978 film review

In my youth, I used to see Peter Van Greenaway's books in the library quite often. When I looked at the blurbs and first few pages, I was never sufficiently enthused to borrow them, probably because it was clear he wasn't writing novels in the same vein as contemporary writers of the time whom I admired, such as Julian Symons. Probably this was a mistake (even if it wasn't a misjudgement of his type of writing) on my part, because I rather enjoyed The Medusa Touch, an unorthodox film made by Jack Gold from one of his unorthodox novels.

Nowadays, I'm much more receptive than I was then to genre-bending stories, and this film blends three distinct types of story - murder mystery, sci-fi, and horror. Let's take the murder mystery first. The film begins with an apparently fatal attack on a writer, John Morlar. The case is investigated by Scotland Yard in the unexpected person of a French cop who is there on some sort of exchange scheme. He is played, pretty well, by Lino Ventura. The first big surprise for him is that Morlar isn't quite dead from the bludgeoning he's suffered. He's rushed to hospital, while Ventura delves into his past.

A series of flashbacks follow. This isn't usually a good way to present information, but it's done fairly well. Morlar is played by Richard Burton and he has been seeking psychiatric help from Dr Zonfeld (Lee Remick). We learn that, throughout his life, Morlar seems to have had a strange power to inflict harm on people who get on his wrong side. And in recent times his misanthropy has been increasing.

The murder mystery element of the story proves to be quite perfunctory, so to that extent my youthful instincts may have been on the right lines. We're dealing with telekinesis here, though (spoiler alert) the source of Morlar's powers is never explained, and I find that irritating. The later stages of the film turn into a dramatic attempt to prevent Morlar inflicting colossal harm on institutions that he despises, and these action scenes are pretty well done. The supporting cast is terrific - it includes Jeremy Brett and Michael Hordern as well as many stalwarts such as Harry Andrews, Philip Stone and Norman Bird. To sum up, an odd film based on what I suspect is an odd book by a writer who was attracted to oddity. But interesting enough to make me curious about Van Greenaway's other work and - at last! - ready to try reading him.

Villain - 1971 film review

Villain is a British gangster movie made around the same time as Mike Hodges' Get Carter. If anything, it boasts an even better cast, led by Richard Burton, Ian McShane, Nigel Davenport, Donald Sinden, T.P. McKenna, Joss Ackland, and Colin Welland. The script, rather bizarrely, was written by Dick Clement and Ian Le Frenais (more commonly associated with sitcoms), as well as an American writer. And the unsubtle soundtrack, I'm afraid, isn't a patch on Roy Budd's music for Get Carter. But it's an intriguing film, well worth watching, and based on a novel by James Barlow called The Burden of Proof.

Burton plays Vic Dakin, a sociopathic gay gang leader who is devoted to his mother but also susceptible to outbursts of violent temper. Evidently he was modelled on the Krays, His lover is Wolfie, played by McShane. Casting these two very charismatic male actors as a gay pair must have been a very audacious decision in 1971, and perhaps the audiences of that time weren't ready for it. Apparently a gay sex scene between the two men was cut from the film, but several rather nastily violent scenes were left in. Some of the violence in films (and even TV) in the Seventies seems very graphic and shocking when I watch it now. And the portrayal of pretty young women as sex objects is not only crude but also uninteresting. At least Britt Ekland was memorable in Get Carter..

Dakin and his crew get involved in an armed robbery that goes wrong, and the rest of the film deals with the consequences of the crime, as the cops, led by Davenport and Welland, pursue the bad guys with affable remorselessness. Sinden plays a crooked MP, alleged by some to be reminiscent of the late Lord Boothby, whom Wolfie blackmails into providing an alibi for Dakin.

This is a far from perfect film, for a variety of reasons, and not only because Burton's version of a Cockney accent is rather...well, Welsh. Get Carter is, in my opinion, a more sophisticated and effective film, but despite my reservations I must admit that I found myself quite gripped by Villain. The script is interesting, but really it's the star quality of the principal actors that stands out. . 

Equus

I’m not quite sure why I have never got round to watching Peter Shaffer’s Equus before – well, in fact, it’s the film version I’ve seen, but the screenplay is by Shaffer. I suppose I was repelled by the idea of a story based upon a boy blinding horses. But although I find the act deeply repugnant, overall I’m glad I watched the film.

It’s a mainstream piece of writing, but really it borrows aspects of the crime novel, not just in the criminal subject matter, but also in terms of the detective work done by the psychiatrist, played by Richard Burton, who tries to understand the forces that drove the boy, played by Peter Firth, to act as cruelly as he did.

Peter Shaffer, with his equally gifted twin brother Antony, collaborated on a short-lived series of detective novels published in the 50s but very much in the Golden Age tradition before moving on to darker and less plot-orientated material. Those books are still enjoyable light reads, by the way.

I found the film compelling, and a reminder of what a good director the late Sidney Lumet was. A word of warning – the violence is graphic, and there is full frontal nudity. Mind you, since the nudity features both Peter Firth and Jenny Agutter, two exceptionally good-looking actors, this might just attract some viewers. The sex and violence is not gratuitous, though. It’s a serious film about a deeply serious subject.

I thought Burton’s performance superb, even though I’d have liked more insight into his character’s personal demons. The parents of the boy are also splendidly played by Joan Plowright and the utterly brilliant Colin Blakely, who died far too young.

Absolution

Absolution is an intriguing film from the 60s, with a screenplay by that fascinating and varied writer Anthony Shaffer. It stars Richard Burton, as well as Dai Bradley (best known as the boy in Kes) and Dominic Guard. Billy Connolly, of all people, also makes an appearance.

In his entertaining memoir So What Did You Expect?, Shaffer describes it as “a twisted tale of the torture of a priest” involving the use of the confessional. It’s an odd story, in a number of ways, and this may be because, as Shaffer says, the film was “calamitously directed by Anthony Page". Certainly, the story, for all its interest, isn't in the same league as Sleuth.

Shaffer’s witty if brutal outline of the experience is memorable: “It was bad enough having a drunk for a leading man, let alone a director who was too much of a wimp...” He explains how, while the film was being made, he realised that a change needed to be made to the story-line, but Page rejected it. He says he learned that “not all thrillers are whodunits to be revealed at the very end.” Whether his comments about Page are fair or not, I don't know. I'd guess his book had the libel lawyers in thoughtful mood...

I tend to agree with Shaffer that the change he proposed would have improved the film. I’m not sure, though, that it would have turned it into a really fine movie. To my mind it is a curiosity, its bleakness a strength but also a shortcoming, and I suspect it’s one of those stories that seemed stronger in theory than in execution. All the same, I’m glad I watched it, because even though it does not match Shaffer’s best work, it benefits from his original way of looking at the world, even more than from his remarkable facility with plot.