Thirty years after its release 'Performance' still remains one of the most controversial movies of the 60s/70s. For many it is an arty pretentious bore that is only worth remembering for being a mother lode of imagery that has been mined extensively by MTV "talents" over the last twenty years. (Cammell/Roeg must be up there with Bunuel and Kenneth Anger as the most plagiarized source for rock video!)
For the rest of us 'Performance' could well be THE great movie of the psychedelic era, rivaled only by Antonioni's 'Blow Up' and Jodorowky's 'El Topo'. 'Performance' merges the hard boiled Cockney gangster world of the Kray twins (exemplified by James Fox's brutal Chas) with the freaks of the rock/drug world (Jagger's enigmatic Turner) and shows they have as much in common as they differ. Reality and fantasy blur, gender and personas get confused, and Chas and Turner become increasingly hard to tell apart.
All of this unfolds to an ultra-cool soundtrack of The Last Poets, Randy Newman, Jagger's lost classic 'Memo From Turner' and former Spector/Stones/Crazy Horse collaborator Jack Nietsche's Moog. Add to this plenty of sex, trips and Jorge Luis Borges references, and you've got yourself a mind-blowing movie experience!! Highly recommended to Grant Morrison fans.
For the rest of us 'Performance' could well be THE great movie of the psychedelic era, rivaled only by Antonioni's 'Blow Up' and Jodorowky's 'El Topo'. 'Performance' merges the hard boiled Cockney gangster world of the Kray twins (exemplified by James Fox's brutal Chas) with the freaks of the rock/drug world (Jagger's enigmatic Turner) and shows they have as much in common as they differ. Reality and fantasy blur, gender and personas get confused, and Chas and Turner become increasingly hard to tell apart.
All of this unfolds to an ultra-cool soundtrack of The Last Poets, Randy Newman, Jagger's lost classic 'Memo From Turner' and former Spector/Stones/Crazy Horse collaborator Jack Nietsche's Moog. Add to this plenty of sex, trips and Jorge Luis Borges references, and you've got yourself a mind-blowing movie experience!! Highly recommended to Grant Morrison fans.