There’s an oft quoted line about Scotland‘s football team how they manage to grasp defeat from the jaws of victory. It’s a line that does in many ways reflect the Scottish character, as we can often appear a nation of heroic failures, rather than an empire building super power.
Yet, this failure comes with considerable cultural ramifications, something that can be seen in Donald Cammell‘s film ‘Demon Seed‘.
Cammell was the son of the poet and writer Charles Richard Cammell, who had written the biography of Aleister Crowley. Born in Castlehill, and not Edinburgh Castle as he would later claim, the young Cammell was considered a child prodigy and by the 1960s had established himself with London’s Chelsea set as an artist, illustrator and portrait painter. By luck and connections he started writing movie scripts and soon co-directed his first, and most legendary film ‘Performance‘.
‘Performance‘, which starred Mick Jagger and James Fox, should have made Cammell a major star but the film was quickly disowned by its production company, was considered obscene, violent pornography and described by one critic as “the most completely worthless film I have seen since I began reviewing.” What should have been a victory, was an unmitigated disaster.
It took Cammell seven years to make his next movie, the sci-fi thriller, ‘Demon Seed’ – a highly provocative and intelligent film. Again, it should have established Cammell as one of the world’s great cinematic auteurs, but Fate was to play a damning role.
Based on the best-selling novel by Dean Koontz, ‘Demon Seed‘ speculated on a computer, Proteus IV, impregnating a woman to create a living hybrid of man and machine. A bit like ‘Rosemary’s Baby‘ except with a computer. Cammell had major studio backing and his star was Julie Christie, was at the height of her fame, with a series of film hits including, ‘Shampoo‘, ‘Don’t Look Now‘ and her Oscar nominated performance in ‘McCabe and Mrs Miller‘. He even had Robert Vaughn as the voice of Proteus. With such talent on board, it seemed Cammell was destined to make a brilliant film and at last achieve the success he deserved.
But no. After years of preparation, and just as the film was released in 1977, a new sensation swept all before it, which made ‘Demon Seed’ look cheap, dull and boring. George Lucas‘ ‘Star Wars‘ changed film, cinema, TV and the way an audience responded to entertainment for ever. As Cammell’s film disappeared, ‘Star Wars‘ conquered the world.
The failure of ‘Demon Seed‘ marked a cultural shift in cinema, the end of an era if you like, for Cammell’s movie was the last of the great, intelligent speculative science fiction films. True, there would be the occasional movie like Ridley Scott‘s ‘Bladerunner‘ or, David Cronenberg‘s ‘Videodrome‘, but cinema and its audiences demanded the sensations that ‘Star Wars’ delivered, and the sound and fury of the summer blockbuster was born.
For this reason, ‘Demon Seed‘s’ failure has been cinema’s and our loss. ‘Sex in the City 2‘ anyone?
A true shame….I am not a blockbuster fan…..I adore Julie Christie….
FIlms like Soylent Green are similar and were part of my youth and science ficiton.
Julie Christie is marvellous, and still makes great films – check out her incredible performance in ‘Away From Her’. But yes, it’s true we have lost a lot with the emphasis on Summer blockbusters, and the demand for high financial returns. It’s a shame, but a trend that I hope will one day change.
I think Jaws was the breakpoint in American cinema. At that time there was apparently a feeling that film had become heavy and boring, though looking back, it had never been better.
Spielberg and Lucas wanted to regress to their childhood and took everyone with them. It was the end of “Film”, and the return of “Movies”
Jaws perhaps was first big sumer hit of the 1970s in the US, but the film was released on January 1st 1976 in the UK (I saw it at the ABC in Edinburgh). Star Wars, however, had a planned summer release globally in 1977. So, Jaws had its wave in the US, but in my view, it wasn’t intended or marketed as a summer blockbuster, which Star Wars was.
For example the merchandise for Jaws hit the shops 6 months after its release – anyone for a shark in a bottle? And the film was re-released in the summer of 1976, as there was no big film that year. Star Wars marked a complete change in cinema from marketing to merchandise. In the same way Jurassic Park upped the ante when it had all its merchandise on display in the film.
I agree that Lucas and Speilberg wanted a return to their youth, but more to the Saturday serial, than to movies, which Star Wars and later Indiana Jones reflect.
Thanks for the comment, John it is greatly appreciated. Beer sometime?