Title: Altered States (1980)
Director: Ken Russell
Cast: William Hurt, Blair Brown, Bob Balaban, Drew Barrymore
I wish Paddy Chayevsky had written more films; sadly he died
shortly after Altered States was released. I enjoy his writing because there’s
always this depth in themes that I don’t get from many screenwriters in
Hollywood. His screenplays spoke of intelligent, relevant themes. By way of an
example, he wrote Network (1976), which I still consider to be one of the most controversial
anti-system films around, very subversive, very critical of society. Now you
pair Chayevsky’s writing with an equally good director like Sidney Lumet and
the result is nothing short of brilliant, Network is a film I love, it’s like a
thunderbolt of truth, highly recommend checking it out. Altered States is also
a good example of the kind of writing Chayefsky was good at, brainy stuff with
intelligent characters searching for the ultimate truths about God and the
origin of man. Can’t get any deeper than that! So how did Chayefsky’s writing
pair with a surrealist director like Ken Russell?
In Altered States we meet Eddie Jessup, a scientist
experimenting with isolation tanks, hallucinatory drugs and an attempt to
regress to a more primal state of existence, namely, Eddie Jessup wants to
connect with his inner caveman! You see Eddie thinks that hidden within our DNA
are the past experiences of our ancestors and that we could reconnect with
those ancestors somehow. This idea is not all together alien to me because
Frank Herbert played with similar themes in his Dune novels; the idea that we
all have somehow, the lives of our ancestors hidden within us, in our minds, in
our DNA and that we could, if we wanted to, reconnect with that collective
knowledge and experience. Of course it’s all trippy as hell and many would call
it hippy mumbo jumbo, but in my opinion it makes an interesting premise for a
sci-fi film, and in the case of Altered States one that explores some very
interesting themes.
Like for example, where did we really come from? Who was the
first human being? Who is God? Should we even ponder such questions? The
character of Eddie Jessup is a very intelligent one, he is always questioning
everything and he’s never afraid of exploring his psychological boundaries.
Brainy people tend to wonder with their curiosity into mental territories that
most would find terrifying and this is the type of theme that Altered States explores.
At the center of the film is the kind of character that likes to poke around existential
matters, so existential, so in depth that others around him can’t take it. Similar
characters have appeared in films like Darren Aronofsky’s Pi (1998), a film centered
around a mathematician looking to decipher the mysteries of the universe
through math equations; ultimately that films message is don’t break your head
trying to find answers to questions that have no answers. It might just drive
you mad. I think Altered States is this kind of film, it’s main character,
Eddie Jessup is always pondering the edges of human knowledge, he dives deep
into the pool of the unknown. When he comes back from these depths, is he the
same guy? Or is he changed somehow?
The film was based on a novel written by Paddy Chayevsky; he
even wrote the screenplay himself, which is a good thing in my book. Even
though according to director Ken Russell the dialog on the film is almost word
for word Chayevsky’s novel and screenplay, Chayevsky was never happy with the
resulting film. He thought it was too loud; he didn’t like the overall tone of
the film, which is at times overtly dramatic, especially when it comes to
William Hurt’s performance as Eddie Jessup, which some might consider a bit
over the top, I personally enjoyed it. I mean here’s a guy trying to face god
in his experiments! It is my humble opinion that Ken Russell was actually the
perfect director for such a surreal and introspective film because his films are
always filled with religious iconography, proof of this are films like Gothic (1986)
and Lair of the White Worm (1988); two very surreal and nightmarish films. Since
the main character in Altered States always ends up thinking about god and the
origins of man, Russell exploited this angle of the story and used it to infuse
Altered States with his trade mark religious imagery, which translates to lots
of crosses, goats, bibles, crucifixions, images of hell, snakes, the whole
shebang. So be ready for an onslaught of surreal biblical nightmares. Visually speaking, the film is a complete delight, so many awesome images and colors. By the way, this was also one of the first films to deal with computer generated imagery. But my point is Ken Russell goes all out with some truly special dream sequences, they are one fo the many highlights of the film.
It’s this awesome mixture of intelligence and art that makes
Altered States worth revisiting. Chayevsky commented that while many saw
Altered States as him going into more surreal territory, he always thought of
the book as a love story, because it’s about this guy who goes after confronting
all the darkness and the nothingness, what brings him back is love. Love once
again, is what keeps us sane.
Rating: 5 out of 5
