Naked Lunch (film)

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Movie
German title Naked Lunch
(alternatively: Naked Lunch)
Original title Naked lunch
Country of production Canada , UK
original language English
Publishing year 1991
length 110 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director David Cronenberg
script David Cronenberg
production Jeremy Thomas
music Howard Shore
Ornette Coleman
camera Peter Suschitzky
cut Ronald Sanders
occupation

Naked Lunch is a British - Canadian feature film directed by David Cronenberg in 1991 . By changing perspective, Cronenberg did not create a film adaptation of the cult novel of the same name by William S. Burroughs , but rather shows its (fictionalized) genesis. In Germany, the film was shown for the first time on February 16, 1992 as part of the Berlinale .

action

In 1953 the exterminator William "Bill" Lee shot his wife in a drug intoxication while the couple imitated William Tell 's arrow-and-apple game with a pistol and water glass . After the fact, he fled to the International Zone in Tangier . Surrounded by diverse junkies, drug dealers and bizarre creatures (including talking, insectoid typewriters and monstrous half-beings, the so-called Mugwumps), Lee stumbles through a surreal nightmare as an alleged secret agent, while at the same time he records his experiences in a novel called "Naked Lunch".

Reviews

  • TV Spielfilm magazine described the film as a "black, humorous, obscene effect orgy" and a "sexually charged satire with a weird feverish dream look."
  • Lexicon of international film : “Metaphorically arranged, difficult to decipher film adaptation of the autobiographically colored cult book by William S. Burroughs. Despite the bizarre and, for more sensitive minds, disgusting description of drug intoxication, the staging and image design create a rather calm narrative flow that inseparably interweaves horror trip and reality and depicts the event as a state of limbo of consciousness. "

Awards

The film was nominated for ten Genie Awards and won seven of them. He was also at the 1992 Berlinale in the competition for the Golden Bear , which he could not win.

background

  • The entire feature film was shot in Toronto, Canada , the birthplace of director David Cronenberg. The scenes that take place in the North African city of Tangier , Morocco , were filmed in sets made by the designer Carol Spier, which are based on the old town there. Because of the Gulf War at the time and the associated insurance reasons in the Mediterranean region, filming directly in Tangier for director Cronenberg was not possible.
  • Director David Cronenberg wrote the screenplay for Naked Lunch in London, when the filmmaker was a supporting actor in the filming of the 1990 horror film Cabal by fellow director Clive Barker .
  • Many film scenes are accompanied by music by the free jazz saxophonist Ornette Coleman , for example with his pieces Midnight Sunrise and Bugpowder .
  • The typewriter beetle, whose body consists of a speaking anal sphincter muscle, by writer William "Bill" Lee is a puppet that was operated by 16 players who acted invisible to the audience beneath the scenes. Director David Cronenberg interprets the scene in which the typewriter beetle Clark-Nova kills the strange typewriter beetle Martinelli as a metaphor for the competition between writers.
  • In the feature film Naked Lunch , the alien creatures called Mugwumps take up more space than in the underlying novel.
  • For his film, director David Cronenberg also used some plot elements from the short story Exterminator! by writer William S. Burroughs, which does not appear in the novel Naked Lunch .
  • The person appearing in the film, Dr. Benway, who prescribes the black powder from the meat of the Brazilian millipede to Bill Lee, is a central figure who recurs in the texts and stories of author William S. Burroughs, for example in his novel Nova Express . The main character of the penniless writer William "Bill" Lee, on the other hand, represents a literary alter ego of Burroughs. In addition, four characters are inspired by real people Burroughs was once acquainted with, such as Hank and Martin, whose characters are based on the two Beat authors Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg , and Tom and Joan Frost, who refer to Paul and Jane Bowles , became friends with this couple in 1963 in Tangier , Morocco .
  • Actor Peter Weller fires a pistol from the Czech brand CZ (Česká zbrojovka) in the film.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Naked Lunch. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed December 7, 2016 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  2. ↑ Audio commentary by director David Cronenberg, 1:56 hours, included in the bonus material of the BluRay Naked Lunch , 2015 (Studio Canal GmbH, Berlin / Arthaus, Berlin)