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Julian Upton bravely delves into Russell's outrageous film based on the life of Franz Liszt.

Released in 1975, Lisztomania is perhaps best described as Ken Russell’s own Rocky Horror Picture Show. An absurdist musical fantasia of the life and work of Franz Liszt (played with pantomime relish by Tommy’s Roger Daltrey), this is as excessive and unrestrained as Russell was allowed to get during his peak period of 1969-75 (no mean feat). The result is an outrageous mishmash of vampish burlesque, movie references and soft pornography that looks like a rock video Meat Loaf might have made with the Satanic Sluts, if they’d been around ten years before MTV. Critics of the time were flabbergasted. And you may well be: 35 years on, Lisztomania is still very badly behaved. But it also stands as further proof that Russell remains Britain’s only genuine punk auteur, up there with Russ Meyer for his ability to marry untouchable style and audacity with considerable technical versatility (this was the first film made in Dolby stereo). You have been warned!

 

Julian Upton on 31st March 2009
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