Ken Russell’s ‘Mahler’ or — Shake That Cosmic Thang!
Ken Russell’s ‘Mahler’ should not be viewed as a biopic but rather a sort of existential comedy/thriller as we are dealing not so much with historical biography but more a cat-and-mouse game between a creative artist and the encroaching spectre of death. Sounds like a barrel of laughs and, amazingly… it is!
The movie is set on a train during the last moments of the composer’s life, making it sort of like a psychological version of the film ‘Snowpiercer’ (2013) starring Gustav Mahler as he seemingly makes his way through the train’s compartments representing different aspects of his past and psyche. His marriage failing and stricken with regret the composer reflects back on his life, career and work, work that at so many points seemed driven by the exaltation of a universal sense of love. Yet what happens when that love is taken away? When the promised immortality of art or the great beyond is destroyed by the fact that all things must end? What is Mahler deliberately choosing to be blind to?
Needless to say this mix of overwrought creative genius combined with existential longing is perfect fodder for Russell who excels at depicting solipsistic, angst ridden, peak-reaching creative types better than anyone else. Moments of transcendent beauty, that affinity for the infinite, suddenly give way to the undeniable darkness buried beneath. The effect is shocking, providing Mahler with no sure footing in existence as he ping-pongs back and forth between existential extremes. It’s no wonder the poor guy had so many heart-attacks and Russell manages to capture that intensity and convey it on the screen brilliantly which could explain why I find Russell’s movies genuinely exciting because I am always concerned that he is going to present me with something — an idea, a concept, a series of images — that could actually drive me insane.
Death, or more precisely the refusal to acknowledge death, is the bad guy stalking the composer throughout the entire film giving it the feel of a thriller or, what with all the operatically excessive visuals, almost a Giallo; only Ken Russell could take the life of a miserable, Austrian composer and make it feel like a Dario Argento movie. And taken as a thriller it’s very well constructed with all the plot points leading up to a gut-punch kick at the end.
Fortunately it’s not all death and despair as the film is extremely funny with Russell constantly undercutting Mahler’s navel-gazing self-seriousness with a series of outstanding gags, so even though there are vast forces of brooding darkness they are punctuated by lightning strikes of low humour and bad taste. Typical Ken Russell, really. One of the funniest scenes is with the doctor who gives Mahler some advice towards the end and not only is the advice brutally spot-on but also funny as hell considering all that has come before. Yet will Mahler heed this advice or will he just arrogantly plough on?
Robert Powell plays Mahler as pathetic, riddled with terror of mortality and the fear of social exclusion, yet also massively arrogant and selfish with almost no thought for anyone else: he is a man to whom his own internal fear of losing a child seems more devastating than the actual losing of one in reality. This is, ultimately Mahler’s undoing: his inability to see a world outside of his own passions and his own head and, if he has the chance to escape his own self-absorption, it is either too late or he recoils from the shock. To keep this charade up he finds himself jumping through many hoops and for all his talk of refusing to compromise artistically we’re dealing here with a man who will compromise or hide within the delusion offered by a deal if it means self-protection or advancement. This is a man totally wrapped up in himself and Mahler’s arrogant defiance of death in the face of the Universe is brilliantly captured by a “flashback” to Mahler’s “birth” where rather than coming into this world as an infant he is manifested, materialised, almost fully formed as pure intellect and ego. This is obviously going to be a man who doesn’t quite live in the real world and, appropriately, the film is littered with fantasy-sequences.
The best example of these is when Mahler converts from Judaism to Christianity before the approving gaze of Cosima Wagner dressed as a Nazi dominatrix. Filmed as a hysterical pastiche of Fritz Lang’s ‘Die Nibelungen’ (1924) it is a jaw-dropping series of ridiculously provocative images whilst yet again, in Russell’s typical way, everything makes sense with a sophisticated psychological reasoning behind it meaning the director can get away with bombarding us with surreal images that actually clarify rather than confuse and get to the very heart of some pretty nuanced ideas and mental states. You really get the impression of what it must be like to change faith, especially if it is driven by those terrible sins of insincerity and self-promotion.
My dad was a big fan of the Austrian composer meaning I grew up in a household filled with Mahler-mobilia so I was familiar with the dude’s life, works and predilection with death and mortality although I never ended up an actual fan, finding his music somewhat heavy-handed and overwrought despite moments of shimmering beauty — sort of what I could imagine the soundtrack to a Star Trek movie would be like if it was composed by Wagner. Either way, this is a fascinating and beautiful film about a very interesting person and Russell, once again, nailing the ecstatic torment of creative process better than anyone.
I won’t give away the ending but it is a perfect example of gallows humour, the illustration of death as joker or trickster, and it is funny and shocking as hell. But just who, exactly, gets the last laugh and is it a laugh we believe?
