The Debussy Film
The life of Claude Debussy, the French composer, is explored in this very unique production of an early Ken Russell, whose visual flair and penchant for outrageousness became the cinematic hallmark of this creative artist. I know very little about Claude Debussy (portrayed here as both an actor playing Debussy, as well as the man himself, by the late Oliver Reed), except that he was French, refused to do much in the way of employment, and had affairs with desperate, despairing. and unstable women who had a penchant for suicide attempts. The narration, told by the French director of the "film within the film" that is this film, is sometimes hard to follow. There is the narrative of a crew making a film in the middle Sixties (replete with rock n; roll parties and go-go dancing), and then the film itself, and then the focus on the life of Debussy, the contemplative genius of a man obsessed with sculpture and high art, and using these vast intellectual tendrils to find his creative fire, to develop his weltanschauung. Finally, there seem to be the burnt, bitter relationships he left in his wake.