Santa Sangre
At the end of the day, cinema in and of itself is simply just another form of art, a meshing of images, sounds, words and music that if put together properly, coalesce into a whole experience for the viewer that might just alter their own perception of reality if done exactly right. Few filmmakers have been more aware of this approach than one Alejandro Jodorowsky, the Chilean surrealist whose films usually must be sought out but can be extremely rewarding if one goes in with an open mind. After back to back masterpieces in the early 70s with both El Topo and The Holy Mountain, Jodorowsky then mounted a massive, all out, big budget adaptation of Frank Herbertâs Dune which featured participation from big names as diverse as Orson Welles, Salvador Dali, H.R. Giger, Dan OâBannon and even Pink Floyd signed on to do the soundtrack. In the end, the whole thing fell apart due to going over budget and all the financiers pulling out even as Jodorowsky DID manage to shoot some usuable footage that would not surface until decades later while David Lynch would go on to do the first official film version. Jodorowsky would then make a childrenâs film and after that go off the grid completely for almost the entire decade of the 80s, only to reemerge in 1989 with this comeback effort, in many ways a return to form in terms of the amazing imagery and compositions which he was known for, but also sadly something that turns out to be a seriously twisted remake of Alfred Hitchcockâs Psycho. It most certainly falls underneath the oft used description of having the first half be better than the second half although a series of late twists towards the end turn out to be fairly decent. Jodorowsky himself does not appear here but interestingly enough when it comes to his main character (named Fenix) he wound up casting two of his own sons (Axel and Adan) to play the part first as a young boy and then as a grown man. The first incarnation of Fenix (Adan) that we see is that of a boy who has been born and raised in a traveling circus sideshow (the setting is obviously that of Latin America and most of it was filmed in Mexico). Fenix is a âboy magicianâ who can do stupid little tricks all while wearing a tuxedo, top hat, and a cape. Heâs the son of the carnival boss (Guy Stockwell, a.k.a. the lesser known character actor brother of Dean Stockwell but still nonetheless probably the biggest name actor Jodorowsky has ever had in one of his completed movies) who also performs as the knife thrower of the show when heâs not busy being a drunk and womanizing. His mother (Blanca Guerra) is another story entirely, the self appointed High Priestess of a religious order which worships as their own messiah a girl who had been raped and then had her arms chopped off before finally being murdered as well, sort of a heartfelt tribute to a horribly victimized person thatâs been taken a bit too far (something which we can relate to in this day and age). When the local Catholic Monsignor goes to meet with them (possibly with an open mind) and realizes just how batshit crazy all of this is, he declares them heretics and that brings in the wrecking ball on their little âchurchâ which in turn brings Fenixâs mother back around the carnival where she reunites with her lecherous husband Stockwell and her magic trick loving son. The whole carny atmosphere in the early scenes of the film is fantastic, much moreso because the locale itself makes it feel eerily authentic (carnival sideshows that in particular would exploit those with physical disabilities have been completely banned in The United States but continue to successfully tour South America to this day, a fact made more ironic by the notion that many American âfreaksâ will allow themselves to be exploited while touring around only to comfortably retire back to America with the lucrative amount of money which they had made doing so) and bits such as the showâs elephant slowly and sadly dying while it blows blood out of its trunk and the subsequent funeral for the animal where the sad clowns have on some kind of a rigging which squirts water (âtearsâ) out of their eyes that along with the filmâs conceit that these same circus clowns pretty much stay in character (and makeup and costume) on a 24/7 basis is precisely the kind of stuff that Jodorowsky had made his name on in his earlier work. Thereâs also a newcomer to the circus, a beautiful deaf mute trapeze girl whom the boy magician Fenix develops an attraction to despite the drama also brought to the table by the girlâs adopted mother (Thelma Tixou), a VERY heavily tattooed woman (although thatâs not all that shocking today) who is making advances towards Stockwellâs married knife thrower, a situation that ends badly for Stockwell (sulfuric acid on his genitals) and also sees Fenixâs mother get her arms chopped off just like her craven idol. Fast forward a few years later as the adult Fenix (Axel) is now locked up in a looney bin, so haunted by the events in his life that he is in a near feral state with the doctors even accommodating him by putting a tree in his padded cell. When the doctors take him on a field trip with a group of Downâs Syndrome patients to go âsee a movieâ, they get handed off instead to a pimp who feeds them some cocaine and then takes them to see a morbidly obese hooker all with the knowledge and consent of the negligent doctors who see this as being some form of twisted âtherapyâ. The lesser second half begins with Fenix busting out of the hospital at the behest of his armless mother (who is still alive) and worse, being so mentally browbeaten by her so that he now becomes âherâ arms, always taking a place either sitting or standing behind her at all times while reaching his arms into the sleeves of her shirt or dress (with his nails fully painted like a womanâs) and being used by her to eat or dress or play piano (even sleeping in the same bed as her which is particularly sick). But then it gets even more worse than that: whenever Fenix finds himself attracted to a woman (who potentially can steal him away from being his motherâs puppet), she berates him into using âherâ arms to brutally murder these same women usually by means of his knife throwing skills (which he inherited from his father) and winds up becoming just about a fully functioning serial killer in the process, aided and abetted by his old dwarf friend from childhood who acts as if heâs the house servant for him and his mother as all the while Fenix maintains a morbid fascination for the Claude Rains version of The Invisible Man (whose posters he keeps up on his wall) and even experimenting himself with different chemicals and formulas hoping to come up with an invisibility potion of his own (which in essence he becomes anyway whenever he âgets behindâ his mom). The only saving grace in all of this is in the extended subplot of the now also grown deaf mute trapeze girl (who is still sweetly beautiful) escaping from her tattooed stepmom who was trying to force her into prostitution and wandering the city scared and alone before figuring out how to find Fenix and maybe save him from his own personal hell. The filmâs redeeming conceit is in knowing from various clues that NOT everything is quite as it seems (including the murders of innocent girls) in what we know to be a possibly paranoid schizophrenic main character, but the heavy Psycho overtones do wind up taking over the entire movie (even with the incredibly twisted new approach) with its portrayal of the weak minded son so overwhelmed by his own motherâs mental torture that he is even capable of committing murder which is a stark contrast from the almost wholly original first half, a colorful smorgasbord of circus life and carny folk tinged with Jodorowskyâs eccentrically artistic eye. But the sight of having a main character killing women simply because his mother (shown as actually being there in person and not just in his head) tells him to makes it that much harder to really care for him or even hope that the sweet little deaf mute princess can be his salvation (frankly we care far more for her than for him) and it sort of takes the edge off just how brilliant the whole thing starts off being and could still have been, but with Jodorowsky and his fans who seek him and his work out, everybody has their own favorites with some preferring this and others like this particular viewer more enjoying the wacked out yet amazing theatrics of his El TopoâŚ
7/10