«The Belly of an Architect» (1987)

 Everything’s permissible for art

An American architect Stourley Kracklite and his wife Louisa are coming to Rome, and the former is entrusted with organizing of exhibition about the XVIIIth century French architect Etienne-Louis Boullee. Stourley is excited about this possibility, but the world is starting to crumble around him, and it all starts... with severe stomach pains. What not-so-known American architect can do about it.

Rome, without any exaggerating, is the cradle of the Western civilization. It has numerous museums, statues, archeological digs, exhibitions and etc., and millions of tourists come to visit them annually. The artists also draw their inspiration from Ancient Rome. Nevertheless, what can we say about modern Rome? It’s like almost any other big city is the city of blood, meat and money.

Monumental art is always funded by big money and history knows many examples when this money is not very clean. Just remember that the Renaissance artists were funded, among other things, by the corrupt cardinals and by the shady bankers. Cinema also could be financed by dirty money or used for money laundering; it even concerns such films as «The Wolf of Wall Street» (check 1MDB scandal).

Additionally, history is full of the artists, who were not very revered by the contemporaries, but whose work became influential for the next generation of the artists. Their legacy is presented in professional books, but the general audience has a very limited recollection of their life and work. Still, from time to time even such artists are getting exhibitions, and the public are introduced to their work.

The film draws a parallel between the vocations of architect and film director. Among other things, both vocations are requiring knowledge of the technical stuff (strength of materials for architects and physics of sound for film directors), people management skills and, the most important of all, they require substantial financial backing. In this aspect, struggling architect Stourley Kracklite is akin to struggling film directors from such films as «8 1/2», «The Public Woman» and « Beware of a Holy Whore».

Every artist has a specific old master, who inspires, and the latter’s work is heavily referenced in the former’s creative activity (Fritz Lang for Jean-Luc Godard, Dario Argento for Nicolas Winding Refn). In the course of the movie, Stourley Kracklite becomes so obsessed with Etienne-Louis Boullee that he thinks that his life is beginning to parallel the life of the great predecessor.

As it was written before, architecture and cinema are very expensive and «The Belly of an Architect» captures the constant clash between money and pure art. The history knows a lot of examples when the creation was taken from the author and changed to the point of absolute noncompliance with the original vision, but it still retained the author’s name (the first version of «Heaven’s Gate» or the American cut of «Once Upon a Time in America»). Will Stourley Kracklite be able to preserve his vision? Watch and find the answer.

Summarizing all of the above, «The Belly of an Architect» is a beautiful and mesmerizing portrait of artist’s struggle in the Eternal City. I recommend you to watch it.

In memory of Andrzej Zulawski (Na srebrnym globie)

Please, what's important or necessary in cinema? Nothing. "Important", "necessary" - I can't understand these words (A. Zulawski)

In 1972, the Polish authorities banned «The Devil» and Andrzej Zulawski left Poland. After a success of «L’important c’est d’aimer», the Director was invited back in Poland and was given carte blanche for his next feature. Andrzej Zulawski decided to film his granduncle’s novel called «On the Silver Globe». For two years the Director was shooting the film and then suddenly the authorities have stopped the shooting. Only in 1986 Andrzej Zulawski got a chance to edit the remaining material and to give a limited release to the film.

On some planet the group of natives found a capsule and pass it to the group of researchers. The researchers examines it and find the filming of an old space voyage. A long time ago, a group of space researchers left the Earth and gives birth to the new civilization on a remote planet.

As we know, the most famous work of Arnold J. Toynbee is a multi-volume « A Study of History». Toynbee points out that civilization is a closed society, characterized by religion and territory. There are the generations of civilizations and every civilization passes the stages of genesis, growth, time of troubles, universal state, and disintegration. Of course, «A Study of History» was published much later than «On the Silver Globe», but I am sure that Andrzej Zulawski has read Arnold J. Toynbee and used the theory of Toynbee in his film.

The film can be divided in three parts: videodiary of a first expedition; second expedition on the Planet by Marek and events on a planet which serve as a base for astronauts. Andrzej Zulawski starts with depicting genesis of the new civilization. On the new planet, one of the astronauts – Marta -  gives birth to a boy called Tomek. Then Marta gives birth to another children and they start grouping around Tomek. The only surviving astronaut Jerzy becomes an idol – the Old Man – and Tomek consolidates his power around a cult of his late mother, father and the Old Man.

Andrzej Zulawski uses the theory of Toynbee as he did in his other films with genres, literature and other things. In «On the Silver Globe» the Director shows how easily society could be corrupted and stripped of any remains of humanity. In addition, Andrzej Zulawski depicts, through primitive society, how ideas and theories could be manipulated and changed, such as Christianity and Marxism.

A lot of Zulawski’s films depicts the lack of faith and it’s surrogates. In this film, the Director tries to remind a blinded spectator about true, not changed, commandments. The red line of «On the Silver Globe» is the Second Commandment: «Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image». The Director warns us that any «graven image» turns into a Tyrant or becomes a tool in a hands of unscrupulous people.

In the second part of a film, Andrzej Zulawski addresses reformism and society by using the Allegory of the Cave (Plato). As Marek arrives, the inhabitants of civilization have become prisoners, poisoned by false believes. Marek is welcomed by the inhabitants as the Messiah, who can release them from the captivity of the Szerns.

While Marek satisfies the paradigm of the «Cave», he is worshipped. Nevertheless, Marek is rejected and crucified as Jesus Christ, after he breaks the paradigm and tries to show a light to the prisoners. Marek is crucified exactly in a moment, when he starts truly believing that he is the Messiah. The Marek story parallels the story of the 1960-1970 Eastern Europe, when the reform movement was crushed by within forces in the Communist parties.

Apart from politics and religion, «On the Silver Globe» is also an homage to the bad actors. In 1998, Andrzej Zulawski gave an interview to Eyeball Magazine, where he said: «In Paris you have 10,000 people who call themselves «professional actors». The difficult thing is to pick the real ones». Andrzej Zulawski wrote a quote to a local man, which illustrates his attitude to this 10,000: «Actor is a victory of ugliness over natural beauty».

If you judge the film from this point of view, the astronauts and locals are those 10,000. The only true actor was Jerzy, but he gave up and become an idol – the Old Man. The other characters are bad actors who are trying to play people, explorers of prophets. Also a lot of dialogues in the film concern acting or pursuit of truth though acting.

It is sad that «On the Silver Globe» was released unfinished, but it is still strong and multi-layered piece of art, which gives you a lot of questions and challenges to find answers yourself. If you’re not frightened by bad picture and translation, rough editing and director’s commentaries or you’re an admirer of Zulawski, then don’t miss this film.