Art for art’s sake… The Age of Consent (1969), BFI, Cinema Unbound, Film on Film

“… to see a painter sit down and paint a girl, this could be exciting, but I had the hardest time explaining to my scriptwriter that this didn't excite me at all. What interested me was the problem of Creation and the fact that this creation in the case of the painter was very physical. He will have to struggle, to fight, even more strongly than he will move away from reality.” Michael Powell

This was Michael Powell’s last feature film and his best film since Peeping Tom for me although not without its issues. Co-produced with the film’s star, James Mason the film is also notable for being Helen Mirren’s first and after all that goes before its politeness or mischief that notes her membership of the Royal Shakespeare Company during the end credits. At least, that’s a view a more cynical viewer might make of a film in which the actress is described by one character as being “all t***s and legs…” and we do indeed see a lot of Helen in this film but, following the lead character’s aesthetic indifference and the good intentions of Michael Powell, this has to be seen as necessary.

Mason’s character, Bradley Morahan, is in search of his artistic truth and has boxed himself into a lucrative corner as he watches his abstract works fetching a pretty price in a New York gallery, attracting buyers with the shallowest of motives all of whom are painted just a little too large. The gallery manager is over-pricing his paintings and it’s working but all Brad wants is to rediscover the authentic commitment to producing honest work. There’s only one thing for it, and he decides to return to Queensland from whence he came, not that his accent is giving that away, and rent a shack on an island on the Barrier Reef.

Harold Hopkins, Lonsdale and James Mason

The story is based on a 1938 novel by Norman Lindsay which was initially briefly banned in Australia (until 1939) and which featured the artistic relationship between a 40-year-old painter Bradley Mudgett and a 17-year-old “child of nature”, Cora Ryan. Lindsay was the subject of the film Sirens (1994) which made much of his free-thinking, bohemian lifestyle and attitude to nudity. That film is a less honourable take on the issue than Powell’s as any relationship between the people played by 60-year-old Mason and Mirren, 22 when filming began in March 1968, is purely artistic for almost the entire film and he’s not liberated by Cora’s physique or youth but by her potency as a subject for art.

It's very interesting to hear Helen Mirren talk about the film as one of the extras on the excellent Indicator Blu-ray set which has both the Director’s Cut, 107 minutes with more Mirren and the original score by Peter Sculthorpe, a leading Australian classical composer, and the 100 minute UK cut for which the studio pulled in Stanley Myers for the score – I prefer the former, which achieves more of a balance between the film’s tonality. Mirren enjoyed the experience, her first major role in a feature film*, and that’s important given that her nudity in the film could have been seen as exploitative. She was 24 and with significant theatrical experience not least with the RSC, and says she was well treated by Powell, noting that this was not always the case with others.

Helen Mirren, RSC on tour

She says that the film could have taken an altogether darker route in terms of Cora’s relationship with the much older man but, as Martin Scorsese says in an interview on the set, confirming Powell’s views at the top, the film is all about the creation of art and the relationship between Cora is more about that than anything else. Scorsese points to this being a common theme running through much of the other director’s work from The Red Shoes through to Peeping Tom and even Honeymoon (1959). Brad’s eye is caught by the lines of Cora’s body, her energies and connection to the gorgeous landscape and it’s only in the very final minute that there is a physical interaction and one initiated by Cora.

Powell used some talented artists to give Brad’s work in progress the richness required and his artistic instincts are clearly shown to be returning the more time he spends in his hut. John Coburn is used for the lucrative e abstract works seen in the opening New York Gallery sale at the film’s start while paintings and sketches by Paul Delprat were used on the island scenes. This location was Dunk Island** off the Great Barrier Reef in northern Queensland a spectacular and raw part of this vast country.

Brad is disgusted with the whole process of the New York gallery sale and decides to fly back to his home country and find a wilderness in Queensland where he grew up. In Brisbane (?) he connects with an ex-girlfriend (Clarissa Kaye***) and the two are seen in bed in ways that will prove that in terms of Cora, his aim is artistic. This is a sexually active man but, not only does his art come first he is more of a “dromedary” in terms of his sexuality than his “pal” Nat Kelly (Jack MacGowran) who, frankly, needs to be on medication.

Nat’s slapstick laddishness is where the film veers a little off course along with the comedic characterisations of Cora’s dipsomaniacal and dominating grandma (Neva Carr Glyn) and local man-eater Isabel Marley (Andonia Katsaros). MacGowran (born and raised in Dublin) plays Kelly as an unlikable rogue and, as with Mason, his accent is a broad brush; he steals from his painter pal and is constantly on the make. If nothing else though the interactions with there three serve to highlight the innocence of the connection between painter and muse.

 

One performer without artifice is Brad’s dog, Godfrey as played by noted Australian terrier, Lonsdale. As with the other characters Godfrey lightens the tone in ways that allow us to appreciate the journey as the serious business of art, honesty and genuine connections evolves.

 

It’s ultimately a happy ending for Powell who sneaks enough meaning in there to remind us all what he was capable of. He may have found it harder to make films for the last quarter of his life but as Marty says, he never stopped making plans some of which involved him as well as his editor, Thelma Schoonmaker, eventually to become the third Mrs Powell.

We watched a 35mm print of the 2005 restoration and it looked glorious, wonderful colours and a tangible warmth that digital doesn't always convey in quite the same way. Such a treat to experience so many of Powell's films on celluloid. Thanks again to the BFI for this Season of Seasons!

 

 

*Helen Mirren also had a brief appearance in Don Levy’s harrowing Herostratus (1967) and played Titania in Peter Hall’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1968).

 

** I’m not sure it there’s a connection but in 1974 a small community of artists was established on Dunk Island by former Olympic wrestler turned tapestry maker, Bruce Arthur allowing a small group of creators to live and showcase their work to many visitors. It’s still there now, just about.

 

*** James Mason began corresponding with Kaye after the filming, and they were married in 1971, remaining so until Mason's death in 1984. He found a muse as well as Brad.

Time for sacrifice… How I Won the War (1967) and Plod (1971), BFI Dual Format, out now!

John Lennon’s in How I won the War on this new BFI Blu-ray set, yeah, yeah, yeah… but Mike McGear, John Gorman and Roger McGough are in one of the supporting features, Plod (1971) a long-considered lost film from the lovable mop-top minstrel, comedian and poet. Together these Liverpool likely lads formed The Scaffold; part Gooney-Beatles (Mike is Paul’s brother)/part poetry collective, The Liverpool Scene – which had included McGough at one point. They were an unlikely pop group with hits including Thank You Very Much and Lilly The Pink a tribute to Lillian Pinkman who invented a rather alcoholic tonic for prohibition America.

In Plod, based on a poem in Roger McGough’s book, After the Merrymaking, they give full reign to their madcap impulses with a loosely formed Day in the Life of PC Plod (Gorman, typecast…) who encounters all sorts on his working day between Dirty Old Maggie May and her fellow streetwalkers up by the Cathedral – plus ca change eh girls? - and a mysterious dog-murderer via strange encounters at the Albert Dock with a yellow-faced McGear (oh dear…)

Stereophonic faith

Still, it was 1971 and Plod is fun, where else are you going to get a gospel song praising, praising, praising! those good old Jellied Eels. Fab lads, although I had to explain this to my children… but they think all Liverpudlians are daft anyway: half their relatives in fact. Funny, but daft, and why not?

Plod also gives some great location shots of Britain’s true second city as it was in the early 70s when I was but a lad. From Hope Street and the cathedrals down to the Albert Dock via Bold Street and the spaces in between, it presents a fascinating backdrop, especially if you look at how things are now with art galleries and retail centres. The humour though, that remains unchanged and The Scaffold are for the ages.

Roger, with whose words they made the movie.

Now for the main feature, a rather earnest How I Won the War starring their mate Johnny and some posh actor called Michael Crawford. Satire always plays with contemporary wisdoms and perhaps dates more than most comedy, but that’s less of an issue when you dig into the context. As the British Empire slowly excused itself from the Pink World and the war raged pointlessly in Vietnam, you would expect to find a film like this one. It pokes bitter fun at the very foundation of an army led by public school donkeys - even grammar school ones - officers who succeeded in spite of and not because of their leadership.

Michael Crawford’s character Lieutenant Goodbody certainly fits in with a donkey, he’s grammar and not public but tries his hardest to fit in with those above. As for those below, his men, including young Johnny Lennon, as Gripweed, the great Roy Kinnear as Musketeer Clapper, Jack MacGowran as Musketeer Juniper and Lee Montague as Sergeant given the fictional rank of "Corporal of Musket" Transom. All know what to do more than their leader and yet there he is trying to lead them to their deaths on a regular basis… like Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, they have do their duty knowing that  their death is as guaranteed as it is futile.

Michael Crawford

In these febrile times in which the achievements of war, dating back to the Napoleonic, via the Boer and the two World Wars, are regularly quoted in terms of the UK’s poltical relationship with modern Europe, this film is a timely reminder that we didn’t always respect our victories even 22 years after the last big one, or 15 years after Korea, ten after Suez and with Ireland about to really kick off. How I Won the War may feel a little over-egged and slightly sloppy BUT imagine Crawford not as Lieutenant Goodbody but as Captain Rees Mogg or Sergeant Francoise. If these people still invoke military conflict as if it were honourable and efficient success then they are mistaken, the Falklands and the Iraq wars have shown the reality if they care to look honestly.

Anyway, invoking Beyond the Fringe’s call for a “noble sacrifice…” Goodbody’s squad have been tasked with setting up a cricket pitch behind enemy lines in an effort to boost Our Boys’ morale: it’s a daft mission but one he intends to fulfil. Director Dick Lester moves the narrative lines around a fair bit to add an extra element of confused unreality, and we see the pitch under friendly fire before it is used. Now we know such issues were a problem – especially with French planes or British warships being used by enemies and friends during recent conflicts.

Goodbody gets captured but gets on so well with the erudite German commander that the agree a deal for the latter to hand over the key bridge in exchange for a business deal after the war. It goes wrong, as all these things do, because of communication and the fact that no one else in the British army knows what hands have been shaken.

Crawford’s character emerges thinking he’s won the war but the deaths of nearly all of his men are the price he happily pays for his own miraculous survival… it’s not too cynical a thought now as we approach another one of those “pointless sacrifices”, to give this conceit far more respect that we might have done in the 1990s-2000s.

The film is now on Blu-ray format for the first time in the UK and is presented in High Definition and Standard Definition. It comes with a set of great extras including a new commentary by Richard Lester authority Neil Sinyard, Richard Lester in Conversation with Steven Soderbergh, an audio interview from 1999 and illustrated books with new essays and notes on the extras.

It’s available now from the BFI Shop and all good retailers.Enjoy it yourself as it may well be later than you think.