With his qasi-western head-trip El Topo, Jodorowsky started the ‘Midnight Movie’ phenomenon, which was followed by the likes of George A Romero (Night of the Living Dead), John Waters (Pink Flamingos) and David Lynch (Eraserhead).
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After more than 35 years obscurity and poor quality bootleg releases the Jodorowsky films have now officially been released in Australia by Siren Visual, an independent DVD and film company. Fully restored and completely uncut Siren is bringing these brand new 35mm prints to Perth for the very first time. This is a great opportunity for these historically significant films to be seen by Western Australians.
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The festival will be held at The Astor Cinema in Mt Lawley from 7-9 November. Our patron Leith Thomas, Siren Visual’s marketing manager who's handling Jodorowsky’s Australian interviews and publicity, will be present to speak about the films with local media and help promote the event. The festival will also include an exhibition of large production stills of the films held in the cinema’s foyer.
The restored films were debuted at this year’s Melbourne International Film Festival. Both were well received in their 11pm timeslots with The Holy Mountain selling out the 645-seat Capitol Theatre. The films drew a varied audience of old and new fans.
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ALEJANDRO JODOROWSKY was born in Chile in 1929. He began his artistic activities at a very young age inspired greatly by film and literature and began publishing poetry at sixteen and developed an interest in puppetry and mime. In 1953 Jodorowsky wrote his first play, El Minotauro. That same year he traveled to Paris to study pantomime and joined Marcel Marceau’s theatre troupe. Throughout the 60’s and 70’s, working in Paris and Mexico, Jodorowsky created over one hundred theatrical productions. From 1966, he created approximately 21 series of comics all translated in over ten languages. Recognised as one of the world's leading researchers of the Tarot, he spent over fifteen years reconstructing the original form of Tarot de Marsella. From this he moved in to more therapeutic work he called Psychomagic. This therapy is based on the belief that the performance of certain acts can directly act upon the unconscious mind some of which are passed down through generations. To date he has published over 23 novels along with dozens of articles and interviews. Jodorowsky’s film career began in Mexico 1968 and since then has directed 14 monumental films including shorts. His original surrealist methods challenged the art of filmmaking and made valuable contributions to the artistic world. Currently Jodorowsky dedicates much of his time to lecturing about his work all over the world. Throughout his career he has gained a reputation as a philosopher and scholar who presents the teachings of religion, psychology and spiritual masters.
THE HOLY MOUNTAIN 1973 Mexico / USA
A Christlike figure wanders through bizarre, grotesque scenarios filled with religious and sacrilegious imagery. He meets a mystical guide who introduces him to seven wealthy and powerful individuals, each representing a planet in the solar system. These seven, along with the protagonist, the guide and the guide's assistant, divest themselves of their worldly goods and form a group of nine who will seek out the Holy Mountain, in order to displace the gods who live there and become immortal. Alejandro Jodorowsky also participated as actor, composer, set designer, and costume designer.
The film was produced by Beatles manager Allen Klein of ABKCO after Jodorowsky scored an underground phenomenon with El Topo and the acclaim of both John Lennon and George Harrison (John and Yoko Ono put up production money). It was shown at various international film festivals in 1973 and limited screenings in New York and San Francisco. However the film was never given wide release until 2007.
EL TOPO 1970 Mexico 125 minutes The movie takes place in two parts. The first half, in an unnamed desert, begins with the titular El Topo, accompanied by his naked son. He tells him that he is now seven years old, and must bury his first toy and a picture of his mother in the sand. Meanwhile, El Topo plays his flute, thus the movie starts. During their journey, they find a lifeless town with all the inhabitants killed. El Topo avenges the town by hunting down and killing the outlaws who butchered the townsfolk. The second half of the movie takes place years later, after El Topo is rescued by a band of deformed outcasts, saving him from death.
Fando Y Lis 1967 Mexico 93 minutes This is Jodorowsky's first feature length film. The movie is loosely based on a play written by Fernando Arrabal, who was working with Jodorowsky on performance art at the time. The film was done in black and white on the weekends with a small budget. The story of the film follows and his paraplegic girlfriend Lisa along a journey to find the mythical city of Tar. When the movie premiered at the 1968 Acapulco film festival, a full scale riot broke out. According to Jodorowsky the audience was enraged at the "corrupting content" of the film.
Indeed, the director found himself fleeing for his life at the festival, finally to be whisked away in a limo, which was heavily bombarded by stones thrown by the angry mob. However, the film's controversy didn't stop there. The film was banned in Mexico and Jodorowsky was nearly deported for the madness the film had created. One of the scenes he points out as being especially disliked involves white-haired women gambling for the chance to suck fruit pits out of a man's mouth. The commentary also states that Sergio Klainer was spreading a rumour that Alejandro Jodorowsky was a vampire, since he insisted that Mariscal's actual blood be used in a scene. At the film premiere, Diana Mariscal was noticed to be abnormally thin causing even more conjecture about vampirism. Alejandro claims she had become thin from an eating disorder.