Absolute Beginners (film)

Absolute Beginners
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Julien Temple
Produced by
Written by Richard Burridge
Starring

David Bowie Patsy Kensit Eddie O' Connel Sade

James Fox
Cinematography Oliver Stapleton
Edited by Gerry Hambling
Production
companies
Distributed by Palace Pictures
Release date
  • 18 April 1986 (1986-04-18)
Running time
 108 minutes[1]
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Budget £8.4 million[2]
Box office £1.8 million[3]

Absolute Beginners is a 1986 British musical film adapted from Colin MacInnes' book of the same name about life in late 1950s London. The film was directed by Julien Temple, featured David Bowie and Sade, and Patsy Kensit in one of her first mainstream roles. The film was screened out of competition at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival.[4]

Upon release, Absolute Beginners received immense coverage in the British media. At the time, the British film industry was perceived as being on the point of collapse (with the recent failure of the film Revolution). However, the film was panned by critics and became a box office bomb. Some of the criticisms included stylistic anachronisms, such as the mini-skirt and decidedly 1980s music from the likes of The Style Council and Sade, the bowdlerisation of Kensit's character (Crepe Suzette had been depicted as a promiscuous "negrophile" in the book), and the casting of Bowie, who made it a condition of his musical contribution. Although the film was not a success, Bowie's "theme song" was very popular in the UK and reached number two in the charts.

The commercial failure of Absolute Beginners and another film released about the same time, The Mission, led to the collapse of Goldcrest, a major British film studio.

Plot

1958. After World War II The People Of London Start A New Generation Of Music Performing Arts

Cast

  • David Bowie as Vendice Partners
  • Pasty Kensit as Suzzete
  • Eddie O' Connell as Collin
  • Sade as Athene Duncannon
  • James Fox as Henley Of May Fair

Production

Christopher Wicking did an early draft of the script which he said "had some sort of propulsion from one scene to the next".[5] He says the script helped raise American finance but then Julien Temple became involved and disregarded a lot of Wicking's ideas. Wicking also says the filmmakers could never reconcile if the musical numbers should advance the story or illustrate something about the characters at the time.[5]

$2.5 million of the film's budget came from Orion and £2.5 million from Goldcrest.[6]

Soundtrack

Absolute Beginners: The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Soundtrack album by Various Artists
Released 7 April 1986 (1986-04-07)
Genre Musical
Label Virgin Records
Producer Clive Langer & Alan Winstanley
Singles from Absolute Beginners: The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
  1. "Absolute Beginners"
    Released: 3 March 1986

Absolute Beginners: The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack was concurrently released to promote the film. Aside from the plethora of music from contributing artists, the musical score was composed by Gil Evans. David Bowie's title track, Ray Davies' "Quiet Life" and the Style Council's songs were released as singles. Tracks 11-18 were exclusive to the CD version.

Reception

Writing in The New York Times, film critic Caryn James was largely unmoved by the film and remarked upon the "uneveness" of Temple's adaptation, and its "erratic" results.[7] Elsewhere Pauline Kael declared that, despite Temple's bona fides, the musical is "peculiarly unlyrical and ephemeral".[8] Comparing it unfavorably to MacInnes' novel, she wrote: "The film has a glossy immediacy, and you can feel the flash and determination that went into it. What you don't feel is the tormented romanticism that made English adolescents in the '70s swear by the novel the way American kids had earlier sworn by The Catcher in the Rye."[8] Jeremy Allen in The Guardian praised Bowie's theme song but described the film as "an overbudget turkey of huge proportions".[9] Corey K. Creekmur stated in The International Film Musical that although the film "failed to deliver on the critical expectations surrounding it", it remained "a deeply interesting, if flawed, attempt to harness the contemporary musical in the services of politics and social equality".[10]

References

Notes
  1. ↑ "Absolute Beginners (15)". British Board of Film Classification. 18 March 1986. Retrieved 19 October 2016.
  2. ↑ Walker p. 33
  3. ↑ Walker p. 54
  4. ↑ "Festival de Cannes: Absolute Beginners". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 17 July 2009.
  5. 1 2 All's Well That Ends: an interview with Chris Wicking Monthly Film Bulletin; London Vol. 55, Iss. 658, (1 Nov 1988): 322.
  6. ↑ "Bad Beginning." Sunday Times [London, England] 15 June 1986: 45. The Sunday Times Digital Archive. Web. 8 Apr. 2014.
  7. ↑ James, Caryn (18 April 1986). "Rock Musical 'Beginners'". The New York Times. New York. Retrieved 6 May 2016.
  8. 1 2 Kael, Pauline (2011) [1991]. 5001 Nights at the Movies. Henry Holt and Company. p. 3. ISBN 978-1-250-03357-4.
  9. ↑ Allen, Jeremy (3 December 2014). "David Bowie: 10 of the best". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  10. ↑ Creekmur, Corey K. (2013). The International Film Musical. Edinburgh University Press. p. 26. ISBN 978-0748634774.
Sources
  • Walker, Alexander, Icons in the Fire: The Rise and Fall of Practically Everyone in the British Film Industry 1984-2000, Orion Books, 2005
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