RIP Ken Russell
Monday, November 28, 2011 at 3:30PM 
JA from MNPP here taking a moment to reflect upon the death of the never-a-dull-moment filmmaker Ken Russell (1927-2011). If you're unfamiliar with Russell's work, oh my god you have to fix that! I listed five of my favorite movies of his earlier today, you can't go wrong with any of them. Well... wrong isn't really the right word. Because they can be very wrong indeed. Sometimes so wrong they're right, but just as often, perhaps more often, so wrong they're just very very wrong.
Whore. Nun. Whore, Nun. Whorenun.
But that's alright! Because in Ken Russell's hands bad taste and good taste... well they got really stoned with each other, painted themselves gold, and headed to the bi-annual insane asylum orgy for nymphs and perverts, and it was hypnotic. In one corner there's Ann-Margret humping a phallic couch cushion while covered in baked beans, in another there's Alan Bates and Oliver Reed sweaty and naked and rolling around on top of each other, in another there's Vanessa Redgrave in a habit with a hump having an orgasmic god experience, and there's Kathleen Turner waving a silver dildo at Anthony Perkins, and on, and on. (It's a very loud room we're imagining, with these people.) There was nobody like him, and there won't ever be again, and movies are a lot less interesting now without him.
What's your favorite Ken Russell movie?
Kathleen Turner, Ken Russell, RIP, Vanessa Redgrave
Reader Comments (10)
So sad to hear about his passing. A few years ago I read somewhere he was supposed to make a new "Moll Flanders" movie. Was always hoping against all hope that he would be able to do that. I just LOVE the manic excess of Tommy and Crimes of Passion, flawed as they may be. Still need to see a lot of his movies though... RIP, Mr. Russell, your mad genius will be missed :(
I love him, too. We have so few provocateurs left which is why i like to trumpet the cause of Lars von trier all the time. My favorite of his is THE DEVILS which I only saw for the first time a year back. but crazy daring and haunting.
and of course, him capturing Kathleen Turner how he captured her... speaking of daring.
The Boyfriend........or maybe I just need one.
Except, who's rising up to replace him? He's 55. Comics have some provocateurs, including Jhonen Vasquez, who was actually set to do a movie at one point, but I haven't heard of a major artistic success coming from an American provocateur since, well, maybe since Happiness.
In the early sixties, Russell directed a series of made-for-TV documentaries on his favorite artists & composers. My favorite is "Any Given Sunday," about the French painter Henri Rousseau. Russell uses actors in re-enacted and probably heavily fictionalized scenes. My favorite bit of casting is the diminutive actress Annette Robertson in the role of the surrealist playwright Alfred Jarry. I love the scene which shows audiences rioting at a staging of Jarry's "Ubu Roi." It's a beautiful and very moving B&W film, not entirely uncharacteristic but a far cry from his later work.
RIP mr. russell...
"WOMEN IN LOVE" will always have a special place in my cinema-crazed heart.
"The Devils" is my fave, but I also liked "Altered States," "Tommy," "Crimes of Passion" and 'Lair of the White Worm."
It's a TIE: WOMEN IN LOVE & TOMMY
My favorite Ken Russell film is The Boyfriend, followed by Women in Love. But I would love to see more of his work that others have mentioned, like the series on artists and musicians.
It's so hard to stick to only five movies, but. let's give it a try: Tommy, Valentino, The Music Lovers, Lisztomania and Gothic... But there are so many more ...