by Allan Fish
When I heard of Ken Russell’s death first thing this morning after going onto the IMDb and BBC websites, one felt a sense of shock. And shock at a death can come in so many different guises. Only 24 hours earlier the football world, in the UK in particular, was beyond saddened to hear of the death of Gary Speed, aged 42, who was found dead after committing suicide. He was loved by many, and as with all suicides, the question arose as to why. My mind also thought back to the fact that, less than 24 hours earlier, he’d been on TV’s Football Focus as bright as a button. It was a painful day for many on Sunday.
The news of Ken’s death brought forth a different sense of shock. He was twice Gary Speed’s age. 84. Not a bad innings, all things considered. But there was a similarity. Only days earlier he’d still be tweeting and facebooking under his moniker ‘Unkle Ken Russell’. It was less than a week ago one saw that he had ticked ‘Like’ to various comments about the impending BFI DVD release of The Devils. I felt like I’d lost a friend, a feeling I’d not felt since Kubrick died. When Kubrick had died Steven Spielberg talked of how numb he was and that he always thought that Stan would direct his Ran at 80. Russell’s death didn’t deprive us of more films; he lived longer but was an effective outcast from the early 1980s. He made films and TV dramas after, but only in the way that Karl Freund kept working as DP on I Love Lucy when Hollywood had neglectfully let him rot.
Ask anyone in the US about Ken Russell and it’ll be D.H.Lawrence and Women in Love that comes up first, for that remains his most famous film, if for reasons that may have little to do with Russell, more for Glenda’s Oscar and Ollie and Alan’s nude wrestling scene performed after Ollie got a bottle of vodka for each to drink before filming. There was so much more to him than that, however, and it’s often easy to forget just what a major figure he’d been in the 1960s. In those days, the BBC nurtured such talents as not only Russell but Ken Loach, Dennis Potter, Galton and Simpson, Peter Watkins, Mike Leigh and Stephen Frears. And just as Loach’s best work remains his TV masterpieces Cathy Come Home and the recently reissued and still firebrand Days of Hope, so Russell’s most important work came at the BBC.
He first made his mark at the turn of the sixties with the likes of a documentary on the Salford of Shelagh Delaney, who coincidentally also passed on this last week. That was a poignant piece, especially for those with an interest in Salford’s history, seen on film in Love on the Dole, Hobson’s Choice and the film of her own A Taste of Honey. He did a famous and now little seen version of The Diary of a Nobody in 1964, but he really made his mark with the series of documentaries, cine-essays and biopics he did for the Monitor strain from 1959-1965. Few who saw Elgar (1962), Bartok (1964) or The Debussy Film (1965) would forget them. Even after moving from Monitor to Omnibus he continued in the same vein; Dante’s Inferno (1967), A House in Bayswater: Prokofiev (1968), Song of Summer – Delius (1968) and the inflammatory Dance of the Seven Veils (1970), a biopic of Richard Strauss so controversial it has never been seen since the 1970s and only survives courtesy of timecoded bootlegs taken one assumes from the BBC archives. One can only imagine Strauss’ estate have successfully taken legal action against it ever being seen again.
To watch them all, or even a selection of them, is to see where what would become the excesses of the 1970s take root. He’d never lose that interest in music and the arts. The Music Lovers (Tchaikovsky) (1970), The Boyfriend (1971), Savage Messiah (1972), Tommy (1975), Mahler (1974), Lizstomania (1975) would all follow and divide audiences to this day. In between there came his two most famous cinematic works. Women in Love remains, with Jack Cardiff’s Sons and Lovers, the greatest large screen English language film of Lawrence’s world, with superb photography and performances from Glenda Jackson, Alan Bates, Oliver Reed and Jennie Linden. But better and darker was to come.
Since the announcement only this month of a DVD release of his The Devils courtesy of the BFI as part of their centennial celebrations, the blogosphere has been in overdrive. Some complained that it will not be the uncut version, only shown a handful of times in public and available only through bootleg DVDs. Mark Kermode, who found the missing ‘Rape of Christ’ footage and has long been an advocate and friend of Ken’s, explained his mixed feelings on video. Yes, it would be better in the full version, but we must bear in mind that the uncut footage isn’t in the best of condition and may not stand up to a High Def 1080pi restoration. We abhor that Warners – or to be more accurate the Bible Belt fanatics whose conglomorates control WB – refuse to see it released on Blu Ray (make no bones about it, the BFI would release it on Blu Ray if they could). But at least they got to putting out an official release while Ken was still with us. Or at least he was until yesterday. Thankfully, the commentary with Kermode is already recorded and can be reused for a hopeful High Def remaster in the future.
What to make of The Devils, the film abhorred by virtually every American critic, who the likes of Pauline Kael and Stanley Kauffmann, and British equivalent Alexander Walker, come to that, would like to have seen burned. True, in America the version shown was so butchered that it was unrecognisable. Besides, their media – this was Nixon’s America remember – are hardly likely to support a film that exposes hysteria, when it so blatantly marketed it. Forget the fools who couldn’t look beyond the end of their noses. The Devils is not only Ken’s masterpiece but one of the great British films of its decade. One which, like fellow British hot potatoes of the same year, A Clockwork Orange and Straw Dogs, grows all the more prescient as the years pass. And for all those who never saw Oliver Reed as much of an actor, the film is a revelation. In any sane world, he’d have had nominations by the bucketload. But Ken’s film had already answered that question; it’s not in any way a sane world.
Everything that followed felt like after the Lord Mayor’s show. He made some good films in the 1970s, but nothing outstanding after the Loudon film. He kept going into the 1980s with Altered States and the underrated Crimes of Passion (at least if you see the uncut version on DVD in the Netherlands under the title of China Blue). A version of The Rainbow followed, but paled besides the BBC version released six months earlier, and then back to the BBC for Lady Chatterley. The old visual eye was there, but it felt flat, tepid in comparison to his earlier works.
It was soon after this, in early 1993, when I first remember seeing him on TV, as part of an Oscar panel on BBC2, in which he championed the visuals of Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula and hoped The Crying Game would do well at the ceremony. It didn’t. He was left to retirement in the New Forest. One still recalls the delight at seeing Ken, in around 2003, as part of Kermode’s Hell on Earth, feeding the birds around his front door and welcoming Kermode, who had brought the tape of the uncut Rape of Christ for him to see it for the first time in thirty years, accompanied by actors Murray Melvin and Georgina Hale. It was a lovely moment and one can only wish that, while I don’t myself believe in a heaven – and both he and Reed were agnostics - he would smile at the remembrances. The best remembrance I could find comes from Ollie Reed himself. This is taken from Ollie’s Parkinson interview in 1973; I have edited it and placed it on Youtube.
The first thing I think about when hearing the name Ken Russel is the campy flick he made of The Who’s “Tommy”, and though it certainly isn’t one of my favorite films (or even my favorite of Russel’s), it’s definitely one of the more valuable pieces of cinema from my youth that opened up my eyes to the potentials of the medium. Seeing it at around 10, as I did, there’s a feeling of being innoculated to all kinds of depravities and extremes in film to come– yes, there’s lots of gruseome and disturbing imagery and scenes throughout, but they’re all delivered with a fever-pitch montage of imagery that starts at the hallucinatory and borders on cartoonish throughout, like Terry Gilliam without the wry sense of humor to balance it all out (there’s humor, to be sure, but a much more vaguely threatening non-sequitor variety, like seeing Gilliam’s more savage animations brought to life in ways that even he didn’t have the nerve to do in live-action). It helps make all the progressive and transgressive work in movies like “Akira” (which I saw around the same time) or “A Clockwork Orange” (which I saw a little after) easier to take in context– “Tommy” provides a barometer by which to judge the strangeness in movies of the time in ways that a younger audience can better acclimate themselves to.
A few years after that I’d catch “Mahler” on IFC, back when they actually took their initials seriously. It was a ratty old print they put on the air, and not quite fit for broadcast even by the late 90′s, but it was still interesting to see, especially when connecting the dots between that and the earlier film on the grounds of their portrayal of music and musicians. The structure of “Mahler” is terrific in the way it fits the essential sum of hte composer’s troubled life into a series of musings on board a train, and though it doesn’t match the iconic power of his collaboration with The Who (which is not a classic, by any means, but would ride high on any sophisticate’s list of cult classics), but it has a wonderful humanism that’s lacking in that more boistrous, eclectic mix of nightmare and pop-cultural profanities. I’d watch it again if I had the chance, but feel no special need to seek it out before other Russel films.
By far, however, the film of his that’s struck me the most (and I’ll admit that I haven’t seen very many of them at all– even his D.H. Lawrence adaptation is one I’ve never had the pleasure of) is “Altered States”, perhaps one of the most pitch-perfect sci-fi dramas out there, and one that I’m always surprised isn’t better known and appreciated than it really ought to be. Of course, it’s had no small influence on modern stuff– there’s plenty of the Russel film in the current cult-show “Fringe”, right down to the sensory-deprivation tanks and casting choices. It’s interesting to note that the cast of this film was originally assembled by Arthur Penn, who only left the film soon before shooting was to start because of issues with writer Paddy Chayefsky, who insisted his script be treated with Bible-fidelity. Russel’s headlong approach, driving the performers to deliver the dialogue as quickly as possible and even speak over one another allowed him to remain to the letter that Chayefsky had put to paper while also investing it with a great deal more spontaneity and realism than a good deal of his acclaimed, but sometimes a little stilted work could sound (he was a great hand at crafting expert and inventive scripts, but sometimes they could sound a little too scripted, a little too preachy, “Network” being a prime and literal example). That no-holds-barred pace also allowed Russel to focus more on the visuals, and in a film tells the story of a man whose positively mad-science seeks to push the boundaries of human consciousness and our control over the body and seemingly all reality itself, it’s fitting that he adopt as experimental a style as his protagonist is in his research. Thanks to the research of the script and the (sur)realism of the portrayal, I’m always unsure whether one should really call this “science fiction” at all, as for all we know something like those mind/body/universe-bending experiments could be happening somewhere on the fringes of acceptable academia. It’s there in the same realm as Castaneda, or even some traces of Jung.
“Altered States” is a film that’s easy to get bowled over by the visuals alone, but it’s also one of the best invitations into Russel’s canon there is. I’m hoping to check out “The Devils” once the BFI release gets stateside, or perhaps I’ll keep waiting until the Rape of Christ is reinstated. At any rate, the sentimentalist in me would like to say the world’s a poorer place without Russel in it, but even a cursory glance at his body of work at least shows he left it a better place than he came into it.
Way to show your A-game by putting this out there so quick, Fish. Nice work.
Wouldn’t call it A-game, Bob, when I spent an hour on it. Let’s say B-.
No it is an A level piece. You are being way too modest.
I’ve seen four Russell’s as I write this (plus about half of Lisztomania) and I must admit I have probably given him short shrift so far in my movie loving life. I was undoubtedly scarred by Whore back in the day, which I still consider one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. Yet after Sam gave me a copy of The Devils, I realized that this was a director with more to offer me than I have allowed him. The movie was a bold and courageous attack on religion with a very unique aesthetic approach. It saddens me to hear that a pivotal scene is still missing from the film due to censorship. I’m shocked, that in this day and age, when A Serbian Film can be found in a midtown Barnes and Nobles that Russell’s film would still be missing a key segment. Regardless of this travesty, Allan has written an accomplished piece here on such short notice. Farewell indeed Unkle Ken…
Yes, but sadly we’ll never see the uncut The Devils as an actual release.
As long as sci-fi zealots continue to cut together fan-edits of movies and television shows, I’m willing to bet we’ll see the same thing happen for “The Devils”, once the smoke clears. And then hopefully that’ll force the copyright holders to put commercial interests ahead of censorship and release the full cut just to get rid of the black market.
Nope, Bob. The full cut has already been released as a bootleg, I have two prints of it myself. That still didn’t persuade them. They have obviously just said to the BFI “you can have what was in the VHS we released in the early 90s, but that’s it. Sadly, they have even insisted they cut it out of the Hell on Earth documentary extra. As Dudley Sutton said in that, “well, they’re just all cunts, aren’t they?”
Yeah, but how good is the quality? Well, at least with the new BFI dvd out there we can count on a better bootleg eventually. And anyway, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a release out of some country where the copyright isn’t as observed. I used to have a plum copy of the “Twin Peaks” pilot before the Gold Box set came out, and I think that was out of Taiwan.
Oh, I agree there will be an improved bootleg, just not on any amount of pushing or money persuadiing Warners to ever release it.
Considering Warners also has delegated “Altered States” to an ultra cheap DVD release nowadays, I’d say the best case scenario would be somebody else getting their Russell films. Criterion would be the obvious choice here, a chance for them to wash their hands of it and pass it off. But of course, that’s unlikely, I suppose.
The point is Bob Warners believe the film should not be seen. It’s not just a question of not releaseing it to DVD. They don’t want ANYONE to release it. They believe it is immoral.
Do we have absolute proof of them believing it’s immoral? They are the studio that championed Kubrick for decades, after all (though to be fair, maybe that just shows how Kubrick fit a little easier into the studio system than Russell).
Ah, but Clockwork was banned by Kubrick himself and only in the UK because he received death threats. Besides, that was just violent, plus Kubrick was American. The Devils targets religion and Christianity and Catholicism in particular and was made by a Limey. It would be seen as sacrilegious by Warners. When I say Warners, there are people at Warners who WOULD like it to be released, but the shareholders of Warners are hardline right wing bible bashers and they make the decisions so have basically said “this film is not fit to be released.” They won’t burn the negative as there’s no point, there are too many prints out there, but they will NEVER release it uncut. They also insisted no Blu Ray. BFI release EVERYTHING in Blu Ray where possible. If it’s DVD only, Warners will have insisted on it. You can have your blasphemy, but only the version Brits have already seen and only in standard def.
Let’s put it simply. There is more chance of Francis Ford Coppola relenting to allow Napoleon released in the full version with Carl Davis’ score on Blu Ray (and believe me, the BFI have been trying to get that one released, too) in the same week the uncut Greed is discovered in Sam’s basement than there is of Warners EVER relenting on this.
Do you know for a fact that the BFI release won’t be a blu-ray?
Of course I know. If you’d foillow the developments you’d know they have been refused. Warners will only license a DVD.
Allan,
Great write-up. I’ve been over in the UK for over two weeks now and the last fews days seemed to shake people up a bit regarding the death of Speed, and there’s a full 2 page spread in the Independent today on Russell. I’ll admit I haven’t seen more than one of his films, but your write-up gives me inspiration to dig deeper.
Get your spade out, John.
This is truly a magnificent remembrance of Russell, one admittedly forged by a lifetime of veneration and authority. I’ve had numerous phone conversations with you about his work, and I can confirm all these heart-felt insights and observances. Yes THE DEVILS is his masterpiece (I know SEVEN VEILS is a vital work too, as are his BBC series on the classical composers and SONS OF LOVERS and WOMEN IN LOVE) And for that matter SAVAGE MESSIAH, THE MUSIC LOVERS and others.
I came very close to seeing Russell last year as the Russellmania Festival being conducted at Lincoln Center, when I attended three screenings including the one of THE DEVILS. Russell was being escorted around (by Kermode maybe?) because of his failing health, and was scheduled to speak at the conclusion of his masterpiece. At the last moment he canceled out. I was actually hoping for a few words.
BTW I was honestly unawares that Kael and Kauffmann both diced THE DEVILS, much as I have closely followed their film criticism.
I have had many fruitful arguments with you on Russell’s work, and am deeply saddened that this icon is no longer with us. I aadmire his reverence for classical music, a passion I share. And I applaud his boldness in doing what he wanted to do at a time when individuality took hold in the arts.
Your goodbye to him is deeply moving and fiercely loyal.
Many thanks. Did you actually watch Seven Veils? If not, you REALLY must.
Oh, and he didn’t do Sons and Lovers, old boy. That was Jack Cardiff.
Russell was a great filmmaker, and I join everyone here in mourning his passing. I think Women in Love is my favorite, but there are several others I like quite a bit.
Too bad you didn’t meet him Sam.
Allan Fish has written a beautiful eulogy to him.
A quick eulogy, Peter, but it’ll do.
I hope people take the time to watch the Ollie Reed interview, it’s not only insightful but funny.
You mean ‘The Devils’ that I’ve loathed all these years is a mutilation?
(though I’ll concede that both Redgrave’s Mother Jeanne and Ollie’s Grandier are pretty great. Reed never got the respect he deserved; he made acting look so easy, viewers simply took his performances for granted).
Well, I’ll knock back some Johnny Walker and rewatch this Huxley/Bruegel hodgepodge when it’s released on DVD. I love to eat crow with a Scotch chaser.
If you’re American, Mark, then yes it is, running around 103m. The UK version is 111m. The uncut version that will never get a proper release is 113.
Just wanted to put Kermode’s own piece up here…
Beautiful addition here!
God, I’ve been thinking about Russell all day. His passing has deeply moved me as it has many others.
I agree with Kermode that he is probably the greatest post-war British director. I also agree with many here who cite The Devils as his greatest film. Allan should take a bow for this tribute to Russell.
I don’t quite see him as highly as Kermode, Frank. A master unquestionably, but whether he’s ahead of Terence Davies for one is a moot point. I’d place him on a par with Loach, Leigh, Douglas and Watkins, though.
I can go along with that. Do you really see Davies as the best of that lot? Maybe. But Russell’s name must be brought up when issuing laurels.
Agreed. But Davies for me is the cream of the crop. Can’t wait to see his next film soon.
I have some catch up to do with Davies. I’ll have to speak to my supplier. lol.
He won’t be able to help you. He’s R2 only.
Nothing of his is on Region 1?
DISTANT VOICES, JOURNEY, and CITY are on Region 1. I could netflix them, as my holdings as Allan notes are on Region 2.
Allan, I ‘d put Lindsay Anderson on the short list, too.
Yes, perhaps.
Allan and I have a mutual friend who has saved me thousands of dollars over the years by cutting out the middle man (movie theaters) and letting me watch his DVD’s. Funny thing is I can’t seem to recall catching much Ken Russell through this scam. So what if he doesn’t particularly care for the poor dead sod! It’s not the mutual friend’s fault I dare say but my own for not looking further into the man who directed Altered States and Salome’s Last Dance…two Andrei “cult favorites” if you will.
All my sympathies Alan and I love the Ran reference.
Nice response Andrei.
Be rest assured I revere Russell, and over the past several years have held him in the highest imaginable esteem.
Andrei, old boy, remember directors don’t come onto Sam’s radar until they play on big screens in New York. Russell’s did a couple of years ago and since then Sam has been a fan.
What a great piece of writing Allan, really. You know, when you’re in the minority of one, well, you must reevaluate your self-appreciation.
Anyway, I want to see more and more Ken Russell, as he seems what a real director must be, a visual master, a guy who wanted to make images that lasted in time. Today I saw two of his earliest shorts and they are filled with great imagery, even if they are silent. I also saw the start of Dance of Seven Veils, and seems so connected to The Devils that I need to see it.
The great thing about this surge of love for Russell in this recent past two days is that I’ve seen only two of his films, my favorite “the Devils”, a masterpiece, and “Altered States”, as well as two shorts, so I know I have a lot to look forward to and that makes me happy, as sad the occasion may be.
Now, where do I have my Russell DVDs Sam sent me?
Did you find them Jaime?
BTW, this was a fine a response on this thread as any submitted!
Doing a double check I saw that no Russell was to be found.
Now I remember, you said you were going to send me some Russell, but never did. Never mind, I still have The Devils around here.
Oh I have others Jaimie, and can send them on to you!
Thanks for this tribute Allan. It was quite sad to learn of both deaths but I was taken aback quite a bit with Speed’s death because I started following football almost the same time as Speed began his career. So he was a player I knew about for most of my adult life. I always thought he carried himself with so much dignity off the field.
He did, Sachin. A genuinely nice bloke. One of the most telling responses came from Xabi Alonso. He may have left Liverpool two years ago, but he was one of the first to put a remembrance on Twitter after hearing of his death from Madrid.
“RIP Gary Speed. My first PL game game was against him, he showed me in that game what British football is about.”
Everyone only had good things to say about him.
Of such dignity that even the most intense supporters of Man United, Sunderland & Liverpool respect(ed) him.
He seemed to have ‘everything’. A glorious playing career, a true beacon of light in post-BSkyB PL era on/off the field, ‘successful’ marriage, healthy kids (both talented sportsmen in the making), and makings of a superb manager (arguably the best Welsh team in two decades). How wrong are we to take some people for granted.