Region 2 DVD: Studio Canal/Warner Bros VFCO3858. 143 minute film with extras. Price: £ 5.00 (UK) if you know where to look). . stars: David Bowie, Candy Clark, Rip Torn and Buck Henry.

check out website: www.warnerbros.co.uk

I haven't see this 1976 film for a number of years so watching it again with a fresh eye and new century perspective made me draw one instant thought. 'The Man Who Fell To Earth' is essentially a Science Fiction movie meeting an art film. The latter is usually full of wide-angle shots, meaningful expressions into the camera and sex, mixed in with naval contemplation as to what it all means. The same applies to this film.



If it was made today, I suspect director Nicolas Roeg would have gone for someone like Marilyn Manson as someone a little off kilter to give someone you would think to be a little bit on the alien side. Back in the 70s, British pop artiste David Bowie fitted the bill. 'Course, if he really wanted to fit author Walter Tevis' character, he would have to have had a couple fingers and toes amputated but I suspect that might have taken things a little too far and we just had to see him sans fingernails, hair and his odd eyes.

Thomas Jerome Newton (actor David Bowie) crash-lands in a deserted quarry lake with a bundle of rings, a British passport and technological information that yields nine basic patents. He's on a mission to get water to save his planet of which other than his family dying out in a desert little is seen. There is no indication of what the rest of his people are like or how such a fragile species, prone to illness in an elevator or a fast driven car, could even survive, could have designed a spacecraft to get him to Earth.

He befriends Mary-Lou (actress Candy Clark), a hotel cleaner when he falls ill in said lift. The attraction no doubt helped that although she finds him strange, Newton makes no demands on her. Mind you, she does introduce him to gin with sugar which no doubt contributes to his downfall. We don't really see much of his business associate Oliver Farnsworth (actor Buck Henry) who runs Newton's business empire at a distance. Instead, we have Professor Nathan Bryce (actor Rip Torn), an ex-university lecturer who has sex with co-eds at the drop of a knicker elastic who is intrigued enough to come and work for him. As Newton keeps people away from himself, this no doubt limits the cast.

Getting homesick, Newton puts all his resources into building another spacecraft. Showing his real appearance to Mary-Lou and with Bryce getting an interesting x-ray later, somehow the information leaks out. The American Government stop Newton taking off and he's imprisoned and drunk as they spend years examining him. Finally, Newton is left in peace but doomed to live out his days on Earth, truly fallen.

Remarkably, this film still holds up pretty well after over thirty years. Other than the odd bits showing Newton's somewhat deserted barren planet, there is little needing special effects just a story set over a considerable amount of time. Most films don't try to lock things down to show a passage of time but several indicators are used here. Newton's company empire is three years before he turns to space technology and probably double that before he's detained. It is through the ageing of the other cast members that determines the decades to follow.

There are some odd things. Of all the technology he handed over, nothing is done to replace televisions. Maybe they only had tube sets on his own planet as Newton claims that is how they got their information about Earth. The end sequence has Nathan Bryce finding Newton's album on vinyl instead of the new sphere chip designs he brought with him. Whether this is an indictment that his business rivals scrapped them when he sold out is for you to decide.

Director Nic Roeg has an interesting eye for film that has contributed to those in which he was second unit director before becoming a director with 'Walkabout'. This one was his third film. If anything, 'The Man Who Fell To Earth' is more of a character study illustrating that even a lone alien can succumb to human vices when unable to offer any resistance.

Although 'The Man Who Fell To Earth' might not be everyone's glass of gin with a dash of sugar, it is thoughtful and worth examining to show that not all alien visitors are invaders out to take over our planet. Often, it is the Earth inhabitants who are the victors even if they don't know why.

GF Willmetts