Details
Movie Description
In Nicolas Roeg's sci-fi tale based on the novel by Walter Tevis, a humanoid alien from a dried-up husk of a planet falls to Earth in a spaceship--and later falls again metaphorically through alcohol abuse and the manipulations of a hostile culture. Arriving as a secret ambassador from a dying world, the masquerading Mr. Newton (David Bowie) patents several basic devices, including a self-developing color film and music recordings in the shape of small silver balls, in order to amass the tremendous capital necessary to build a spaceship. Along the way he solicits the help of a crack patent lawyer (Buck Henry) and a country-fried small-town girl (Candy Clark) who introduces him to gin, which he soon begins to substitute for his customary glass of water. Newton debates the reality of returning to his dead world only to have the choice made for him when he is swept from the launchpad by government agents. After serving his time with men in black, he is released, blinded by x rays, into the world. As a last drunken hurrah, he records an album under the name the Visitor with the hope that it may someday be broadcast and heard by his family and friends back home.
Connected throughout by intercut clips of television programs, classic movies, and film soundtracks, THE MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH is an fine example of the postmodern technique of work referring to its own medium and history. Like much 1970s sci-fi, it is heavily indebted to Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY; a scene in which an upset tray of cookies is juxtaposed with flying bodies echoes the film's flying bone and spaceship. Juxtaposing the free love enjoyed by Dr. Bryce (Rip Torn) with post-Altamont, pre-Reagan paranoia, Roeg's film manages to be at once artistically groundbreaking and a crystallization of the post-Summer of Love era.
Synopsis
An alien being travels to Earth in human form with a plan to bring water to his own dying planet. Once on Earth, the superintelligent space traveler begins making the social and financial climbs necessary for his plot to succeed. But he finds earthly pleasures far more enticing than he ever imagined and gradually slides into a life of shallow debauchery.
Industry Reviews
4 stars out of 5 -- "[A] 1976 sci-fi masterpiece....[It] probes environmental degradation and the corporate state in ever-relevant terms."
Rolling Stone - Peter Relic (09/22/2005)
"It remains visually stunning..." -- Grade: B
Entertainment Weekly - Dalton Ross (10/07/2005)
3.5 stars out of 4 -- "Roeg is a true cinematic poet, but he's a determinedly modernist one..."
Premiere - Glenn Kenny (11/01/2005)
4 stars out of 5 -- "THE MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH crowned Roeg as the heir to '60s time-tweaking experimental mentalists like Godard and Resnais."
Total Film - Andy Lowe (03/01/2007)
3 stars out of 5 -- "[E]ntirely of its own kind, and at times mesmerising."
Uncut - Jonathan Romney (03/01/2007)
"[A] kaleidoscopic jumble of images and ideas....[With] some bravura camera and editing tricks..."
Sight and Sound - Matthew Leyland (03/01/2007)
Quotations
"The strange thing about television is that it doesn't tell you anything."--Thomas Newton (David Bowie) to Bryce (Rip Torn)
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