"You're an alien... Your visa has expired." Thus Paul Mayersberg reinterprets Walter Tevis' 1963 novel, which dealt with displacement, isolation, illness and his own alcoholism - I'd say all that is faithfully retained in the movie, which is a sad film (and I think Roeg likes to make sad films), well acted (particularly by Bowie and Candy Clark) and strange (the sound design is marvellously odd). Crammed with the usual references to art, films, history. Anthony Richmond shoots on natural locations in New Mexico on the zoom, which Graeme Clifford likes to cut between (it's similar in this way to Altman's
Images which he also edited).
With Rip Torn, Buck Henry, Bernie Casey.
Composer Stomu Yamashta is another link to
Images.
Fascinating, complex and stylish, though I didn't find it as enjoyable as when I was a teenager, that's for sure. Who was it who witnessed his arrival? That's never made clear. I wonder if it would have worked better without the flashbacks to the alien world and its Weetabix-designed train. Long.
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