SusannahZardoz on DVD
October 24th 2006 03:50
Zardoz on DVD
Written and Directed by John Boorman.
Starring: Sean Connery, Charlotte Rampling.
There aren’t too many films that open with a giant stone head (and a flying one at that) proclaiming “The gun is good…the penis is evil” to a legion of hirsute men dressed in rust-orange loin-cloths. The head then follows this declaration by vomiting a vast number of the afore-mentioned weapons down upon its followers (some of whom wear masks fashioned in the likeness of said giant head). It’s an odd moment in an odd film.
This may be John Boorman, but there’s not a banjo-plucking redneck in sight nor is anyone compelled to squeal like a piggy. This is a meditation upon a dystopian society crippled by its inability to progress…to adapt…to advance. But it’s not one that George Orwell would recognize.
Nope, this is seventies sci-fi so tripped out and drug-glazed that you can almost smell the hash-smoke. “I have seen the future and it doesn’t work” ran the tagline and it’s as good a synopsis as any. Meet Zed, he’s played by a post-Bond Sean Connery replete with porn-moustache and receding hairline, he’s also tooled out in one of the afore-mentioned posing pouches. He is a Brutal. An unthinking thug compelled to acts of violence by the rhetoric-spouting stone head that they call Zardoz. Zed and his pals charge around apocalyptic landscapes on horse-back while gunning down people dressed in what appear to be black business suits. It is the purpose of the Brutals to sow the seeds of death…Zardoz is vague on the details. Anyhow, Zed is smarter than the average Neanderthal and smuggles himself into Zardoz’s cranium (it’s full of grain and, for some reason, people sealed inside dry-cleaning bags). Together they fly to the land from which Zardoz comes and it is here that things get…complicated.
See, there’s these other people that swan about in pastel blouses and act generally vague. They’re isolated from the Brutals and the ruined outside world by some sort of invisible force-field and they’re immortal (well more or less). With this immortality comes boredom, ennui and a slow dissolution into absolute apathy. Zed is there for a purpose and it’s not just to provide the lovely Consuella (played by an occasionally topless Charlotte Rampling) with a bit of rough.
At times ingenious, at other times just plain wigged-out: this head-trip climaxes with Connery imprisoned inside the facets of a crystal, an over-the-top bloodbath, and a really weird example of time-lapse photography.
Needless to say, critics did not receive it well and since its release it has drifted around the fringes of cinema. It has screened at the odd film festival and is currently available on DVD for purchase and hire. The set design is actually pretty darn fantastic and the cinematography is frequently lovely. Connery is gruff and seemingly irresistible to women (so, business as usual for the Scotsman) and Rampling gives one of those charmingly remote performances so often found in this kind of cinema. Niall Buggy (the actor’s name, not some sort of joke on my part) gives good mad visionary in the role of Arthur Frayn (the truth behind the talking head). The plot is littered with moments of deranged inspiration that keep it from ever dragging (see Connery in a wedding dress) and to be honest…there’s something about this film that I just plain like.
Interestingly enough it’s influence is still felt today in the weird world of B-Grade sci-fi. Notably, Aeon Flux (the loathed cinematic adaptation starring Charlize Theron, not the original MTV series) stole many of its third act revelations from Boorman’s flick.
Written and Directed by John Boorman.
Starring: Sean Connery, Charlotte Rampling.
There aren’t too many films that open with a giant stone head (and a flying one at that) proclaiming “The gun is good…the penis is evil” to a legion of hirsute men dressed in rust-orange loin-cloths. The head then follows this declaration by vomiting a vast number of the afore-mentioned weapons down upon its followers (some of whom wear masks fashioned in the likeness of said giant head). It’s an odd moment in an odd film.
This may be John Boorman, but there’s not a banjo-plucking redneck in sight nor is anyone compelled to squeal like a piggy. This is a meditation upon a dystopian society crippled by its inability to progress…to adapt…to advance. But it’s not one that George Orwell would recognize.
Nope, this is seventies sci-fi so tripped out and drug-glazed that you can almost smell the hash-smoke. “I have seen the future and it doesn’t work” ran the tagline and it’s as good a synopsis as any. Meet Zed, he’s played by a post-Bond Sean Connery replete with porn-moustache and receding hairline, he’s also tooled out in one of the afore-mentioned posing pouches. He is a Brutal. An unthinking thug compelled to acts of violence by the rhetoric-spouting stone head that they call Zardoz. Zed and his pals charge around apocalyptic landscapes on horse-back while gunning down people dressed in what appear to be black business suits. It is the purpose of the Brutals to sow the seeds of death…Zardoz is vague on the details. Anyhow, Zed is smarter than the average Neanderthal and smuggles himself into Zardoz’s cranium (it’s full of grain and, for some reason, people sealed inside dry-cleaning bags). Together they fly to the land from which Zardoz comes and it is here that things get…complicated.
See, there’s these other people that swan about in pastel blouses and act generally vague. They’re isolated from the Brutals and the ruined outside world by some sort of invisible force-field and they’re immortal (well more or less). With this immortality comes boredom, ennui and a slow dissolution into absolute apathy. Zed is there for a purpose and it’s not just to provide the lovely Consuella (played by an occasionally topless Charlotte Rampling) with a bit of rough.
At times ingenious, at other times just plain wigged-out: this head-trip climaxes with Connery imprisoned inside the facets of a crystal, an over-the-top bloodbath, and a really weird example of time-lapse photography.
Needless to say, critics did not receive it well and since its release it has drifted around the fringes of cinema. It has screened at the odd film festival and is currently available on DVD for purchase and hire. The set design is actually pretty darn fantastic and the cinematography is frequently lovely. Connery is gruff and seemingly irresistible to women (so, business as usual for the Scotsman) and Rampling gives one of those charmingly remote performances so often found in this kind of cinema. Niall Buggy (the actor’s name, not some sort of joke on my part) gives good mad visionary in the role of Arthur Frayn (the truth behind the talking head). The plot is littered with moments of deranged inspiration that keep it from ever dragging (see Connery in a wedding dress) and to be honest…there’s something about this film that I just plain like.
Interestingly enough it’s influence is still felt today in the weird world of B-Grade sci-fi. Notably, Aeon Flux (the loathed cinematic adaptation starring Charlize Theron, not the original MTV series) stole many of its third act revelations from Boorman’s flick.
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Film & TV on DVD
A guilty pleasure to be sure but the costumes alone keep me laughing throughout. Fun to view after a screening of Mike Hodges Flash Gordon.
On the Connery Sci Fi tip Outland is not as bad as some say. Its an entertaining retelling of High Noon in space.