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WR: Mysteries of the Organism : Testament to the Life and Teachings of Wilhelm Reich
W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism, a 1971 film by Serbian director Dušan Makavejev, is a cinematic homage to the work of psychologist Wilhelm Reich, matched with a story about a Yugoslavian girl's affair with a Russian skater. Sexual repression, social systems and the Reich's orgone theory are explored. The film's narrative structure is unconventional, intermixing fictional and documentary elements.
After initial screenings, both in and out of Yugoslavia, W.R. was banned in that country for the next 16 years. Makavejev was subsequently indicted there on criminal charges of "derision" towards "the state, its agencies, and representatives" after he made intemperate remarks to a West German newspaper about the ban. His exile from his home country lasted until the end of the regime.
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Plot:
The film intercuts documentary footage and clips from other films — notably the Stalinist propaganda film The Vow (1946) — with an imaginative and satirical narrative about a highly political Yugoslav woman who seduces a visiting Soviet celebrity ice skater. Despite different settings, characters and time periods, the different elements produce a single story of human sexuality and revolution through montage.
The woman, Milena, violates her proletarian convictions (and rejects the sexual advances of a worker) by pursuing a Joseph Stalin-like celebrity ice skater — Vladimir Ilyich (Lenin's first name and patronymic) — who represents both class oppression and corruption from the West into communist beliefs. She succeeds, with difficulty, in sexual consummation, but V.I. is unable to reconcile his inner conflicts and ends the encounter by decapitating her. Distraught, V.I. sings a Russian song after the murder: "François Villon's Prayer" by Bulat Okudzhava.
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Poet and performance artist Tuli Kupferberg of the band The Fugs, dressed as a soldier, parodies war and the sexual nature of human fascination with guns by stalking affluent New Yorkers on the street and masturbating his toy rifle. The scene is set to The Fugs' 1965 song "Kill for Peace". As part of the film's climax, the gun masturbation imagery is intercut with other orgasmic sequences. This segment highlights Reich's ideas that sexual frustration and violence are connected.
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Artist Betty Dodson discusses her experiences in drawing acts of masturbation, as well as her discussions within consciousness raising groups about female sexual response. The Dodson sequences are relatively straightforward documentary interviews; Dodson's large scale drawing of a man masturbating dominates the background of the shots. This segment illustrates a freer attitude toward sexuality.
____
New York artist Nancy Godfrey was among a loose group called Plaster Casters, who were known for taking plaster casts of rock stars penises. In a meeting with Jim Buckley, co-founder-editor of the porn magazine Screw, Godfrey makes a plaster cast of Buckley's erect penis as a documentary part of the film. The soundtrack features another song by The Fugs, "I'm Gonna Kill Myself Over Your Dead Body", with Tuli Kupferberg satirically mimicking John Wayne in his a cappella vocals.
_____
Jackie Curtis, a cross-dressing member of Andy Warhol's entourage and star in his films, is shown on the streets of New York enjoying an ice cream cone with a partner. Curtis' appearance highlighted Reich's theories of gender and sexuality.
____
The film features a rare on-screen interview with neo-Reichian therapist Alexander Lowen, the founder of bioenergetic analysis, during a therapy session, including scream treatment.
____
Reich's daughter Eva (1924–2008) appears on camera, speaking about her father's work and the sickness of contemporary life.
____
The film includes re-stagings of scenes from Sergei Eisenstein films, alluding to the montage era of film making in the Soviet Union.
___
Shots of the incinerator in which Reich's books were burned in New York City are also included in the movie.
After initial screenings, both in and out of Yugoslavia, W.R. was banned in that country for the next 16 years. Makavejev was subsequently indicted there on criminal charges of "derision" towards "the state, its agencies, and representatives" after he made intemperate remarks to a West German newspaper about the ban. His exile from his home country lasted until the end of the regime.
____
Plot:
The film intercuts documentary footage and clips from other films — notably the Stalinist propaganda film The Vow (1946) — with an imaginative and satirical narrative about a highly political Yugoslav woman who seduces a visiting Soviet celebrity ice skater. Despite different settings, characters and time periods, the different elements produce a single story of human sexuality and revolution through montage.
The woman, Milena, violates her proletarian convictions (and rejects the sexual advances of a worker) by pursuing a Joseph Stalin-like celebrity ice skater — Vladimir Ilyich (Lenin's first name and patronymic) — who represents both class oppression and corruption from the West into communist beliefs. She succeeds, with difficulty, in sexual consummation, but V.I. is unable to reconcile his inner conflicts and ends the encounter by decapitating her. Distraught, V.I. sings a Russian song after the murder: "François Villon's Prayer" by Bulat Okudzhava.
____
Poet and performance artist Tuli Kupferberg of the band The Fugs, dressed as a soldier, parodies war and the sexual nature of human fascination with guns by stalking affluent New Yorkers on the street and masturbating his toy rifle. The scene is set to The Fugs' 1965 song "Kill for Peace". As part of the film's climax, the gun masturbation imagery is intercut with other orgasmic sequences. This segment highlights Reich's ideas that sexual frustration and violence are connected.
____
Artist Betty Dodson discusses her experiences in drawing acts of masturbation, as well as her discussions within consciousness raising groups about female sexual response. The Dodson sequences are relatively straightforward documentary interviews; Dodson's large scale drawing of a man masturbating dominates the background of the shots. This segment illustrates a freer attitude toward sexuality.
____
New York artist Nancy Godfrey was among a loose group called Plaster Casters, who were known for taking plaster casts of rock stars penises. In a meeting with Jim Buckley, co-founder-editor of the porn magazine Screw, Godfrey makes a plaster cast of Buckley's erect penis as a documentary part of the film. The soundtrack features another song by The Fugs, "I'm Gonna Kill Myself Over Your Dead Body", with Tuli Kupferberg satirically mimicking John Wayne in his a cappella vocals.
_____
Jackie Curtis, a cross-dressing member of Andy Warhol's entourage and star in his films, is shown on the streets of New York enjoying an ice cream cone with a partner. Curtis' appearance highlighted Reich's theories of gender and sexuality.
____
The film features a rare on-screen interview with neo-Reichian therapist Alexander Lowen, the founder of bioenergetic analysis, during a therapy session, including scream treatment.
____
Reich's daughter Eva (1924–2008) appears on camera, speaking about her father's work and the sickness of contemporary life.
____
The film includes re-stagings of scenes from Sergei Eisenstein films, alluding to the montage era of film making in the Soviet Union.
___
Shots of the incinerator in which Reich's books were burned in New York City are also included in the movie.
Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1974
23 people want to read
About the author
Dušan Makavejev
8 books1 followerRođen 1932. u Beogradu. Roditelji su mu bili Sergije Makavejev i Jelka rođena Bojkić, prva žena diplomirani veterinar u Jugoslaviji. Diplomirao psihologiju i filmsku režiju. Pedesetih godina jedan je od najistaknutijih kinoklubaša, kada nastaju njegovi prvi filmski uradci među kojima i horor „Pečat“ (1956) u kojem igra Jovan Ćirilov.
Neka od najznačajnijih ostvarenja Makavejeva su: dokumentarac „Parada“ iz 1962, igrani filmovi „Čovek nije tica“ (1965) u kome se vidi njegova „karnevalska poetika“ – kombinovanje dokumentarnog i igranog materijala, česta upotreba kamere iz ruke, ironija, razigranost, bizarni detalji, politička i erotska provokativnost. Seksualnost, je često propitivao u svojim filmovima, a najradikalniji primeri toga su „W. R. Misterije organizma“ i „Sweet Movie“.
Antologijski su i filmovi „Ljubavni slučaj ili tragedija službenice PTT“ (1967) i „Nevinost bez zaštite“ koji je osvojio Srebrnog medveda i nagradu međunarodne kritike.
Dobitnik je velikog broja domaćih i stranih nagrada: Oktobarska nagrada Beograda, Srebrni medved u Berlinu, Srebrna arena u Puli, Luis Bunjuel u Kanu, Srebrni Hugo u Čikagu, Zlatno doba Belgijske kraljevske kinoteke, „Filmska legenda“ koju dodeljuje Festival filmova jugoistočne Evrope sa sedištem u Parizu.
____
In English:
Dusan Makavejev is the premier figure in Yugoslavian film history; his films are deeply rooted in his nation's painful postwar experiences and draw on important Yugoslavian cinematic and cultural models. In the 1950s, after studying psychology at Belgrade University, Makavejev became involved in the activities of various film societies and festivals and studied direction at the Academy for Radio, Television and Film. As early as 1953, he began making short films and documentaries and would work in various capacities at both the Zagreb and Avala studios during the late 50s and early 60s. The documentary impulse remains powerful in Makavejev's work, as does the tendency to intercut undigested segments from other films into longer works.
Makavejev enjoyed great critical success with his first three features, Man Is Not a Bird (1965), "Love Affair" (1967) and Innocence Unprotected (1968). Highly allegorical and relying on techniques derived from Brecht and influenced by Godard, these films were sardonic and anarchistic views of Eastern European state socialist milieus.
Much of Makavejev's work has been uncompromisingly experimental as well as politically outrageous. WR: Mysteries of the Organism (1971) is the best example of this combination and is the director's most influential work to date.
Sweet Movie (1974)- a disjointed, two-part narrative, it again focuses on radical techniques in sexual psychotherapy, here played out rather than verbalized.
Montenegro (1981) has been Makavejev's greatest financial success to date. Political commentary and formal experimentation are subordinated to narrative drive in this story of a housewife (Susan Anspach) who grapples with sexual liberation and fails.
The Coca-Cola Kid (1985), - a genuinely erotic film which takes a quirky, satiric view both of its Australian setting and the international business world.
Makavejev's long exile from his homeland ended in 1988 with the release of Manifesto (1988), a Ruritanian political farce mostly shot in Yugoslavia.
Gorilla Bathes at Noon (1993), a political comedy based on the adventures of a Russian soldier as he wanders around Berlin.
Family wife: Bojana Marijan (married in 1964; has worked with Makavejev)
Education Academy of Theater, Radio, Film and Television Belgrade, Yugoslavia Belgrade University Belgrade, Yugoslavia psychology 1955.
Neka od najznačajnijih ostvarenja Makavejeva su: dokumentarac „Parada“ iz 1962, igrani filmovi „Čovek nije tica“ (1965) u kome se vidi njegova „karnevalska poetika“ – kombinovanje dokumentarnog i igranog materijala, česta upotreba kamere iz ruke, ironija, razigranost, bizarni detalji, politička i erotska provokativnost. Seksualnost, je često propitivao u svojim filmovima, a najradikalniji primeri toga su „W. R. Misterije organizma“ i „Sweet Movie“.
Antologijski su i filmovi „Ljubavni slučaj ili tragedija službenice PTT“ (1967) i „Nevinost bez zaštite“ koji je osvojio Srebrnog medveda i nagradu međunarodne kritike.
Dobitnik je velikog broja domaćih i stranih nagrada: Oktobarska nagrada Beograda, Srebrni medved u Berlinu, Srebrna arena u Puli, Luis Bunjuel u Kanu, Srebrni Hugo u Čikagu, Zlatno doba Belgijske kraljevske kinoteke, „Filmska legenda“ koju dodeljuje Festival filmova jugoistočne Evrope sa sedištem u Parizu.
____
In English:
Dusan Makavejev is the premier figure in Yugoslavian film history; his films are deeply rooted in his nation's painful postwar experiences and draw on important Yugoslavian cinematic and cultural models. In the 1950s, after studying psychology at Belgrade University, Makavejev became involved in the activities of various film societies and festivals and studied direction at the Academy for Radio, Television and Film. As early as 1953, he began making short films and documentaries and would work in various capacities at both the Zagreb and Avala studios during the late 50s and early 60s. The documentary impulse remains powerful in Makavejev's work, as does the tendency to intercut undigested segments from other films into longer works.
Makavejev enjoyed great critical success with his first three features, Man Is Not a Bird (1965), "Love Affair" (1967) and Innocence Unprotected (1968). Highly allegorical and relying on techniques derived from Brecht and influenced by Godard, these films were sardonic and anarchistic views of Eastern European state socialist milieus.
Much of Makavejev's work has been uncompromisingly experimental as well as politically outrageous. WR: Mysteries of the Organism (1971) is the best example of this combination and is the director's most influential work to date.
Sweet Movie (1974)- a disjointed, two-part narrative, it again focuses on radical techniques in sexual psychotherapy, here played out rather than verbalized.
Montenegro (1981) has been Makavejev's greatest financial success to date. Political commentary and formal experimentation are subordinated to narrative drive in this story of a housewife (Susan Anspach) who grapples with sexual liberation and fails.
The Coca-Cola Kid (1985), - a genuinely erotic film which takes a quirky, satiric view both of its Australian setting and the international business world.
Makavejev's long exile from his homeland ended in 1988 with the release of Manifesto (1988), a Ruritanian political farce mostly shot in Yugoslavia.
Gorilla Bathes at Noon (1993), a political comedy based on the adventures of a Russian soldier as he wanders around Berlin.
Family wife: Bojana Marijan (married in 1964; has worked with Makavejev)
Education Academy of Theater, Radio, Film and Television Belgrade, Yugoslavia Belgrade University Belgrade, Yugoslavia psychology 1955.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
February 26, 2008
The "WR" here stands for Wilhelm Reich, the great pioneer of sexual understanding & great critic of repressive social systems. Reich was imprisoned in the United States - basically as a quack - & his bks were burned. He died in prison. It can't happen here, right?! The incredible Yugoslavian director Dusan Makavejev made this paeon to Reich's theories mixed w/ a spectacularly bombastic monstrosity of sexual humor & political satire. This, & Makavajev's "Sweet Movie", represent(s) a particular peak in the director's style. What boggles my mind is that such films get made at all. & that so many truly incredible films get made, bks get written, music gets played.. - &, yet, tune in the tv, look at the newspapers, what do you see? Imbecility out the wazoo! I mean you'd think that humanity is barely functional - w/ no individual minds worth speaking of. Wch is, apparently, what this society, & Iran, & so many others appears to have in mind. I named one of my favorite films that I ever made: "You Haven't Heard the Record, You Haven't Read the Book! NOW!! Don't See the Movie!!" & that about sums it up. If you don't make at least SOME effort to find out about the mind-boggling culture that DOES INDEED EXIST out there, you'll be doomed to Britney Spears HELL for the rest of yr life.
Displaying 1 of 1 review