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DONALD CAMMELL
Examines the life and work of the Scottish artist and film director, from his youth and early career as a portrait painter, through his direction of the influential cult film "Performance," and his eventual suicide in 1996.
100 pages, Paperback
First published June 30, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 22, 2026
MURDER IS A WORK OF ART
Iconoclast by nature - 'the only performance that really makes it is the one that achieves madness - Donald Cammell is a great subject for bio. His film roster is short, but the subject matter of his movies is worth a trillion Hollywood fallback-position CGI epics. Acute visuals, literate storylines -metaphor mash-ups that declare themselves via narrative-driven flesh-and-blood characters, The best movies are the ones he screenplayed from ground zero -PERFORMANCE - WHITE OF THE EYE (though the latter was based on a novel -DC redimentionalized it). Not forgetting Walken in WILD SIDE.
This book is a detailed attempt at Cammell (good on his mercurial persona) and his movies (great on Performance & White of the Eye). It covers the earlier auteur work, his work with unmade scripts, etc, his association with Brando and Anger and such.
It's a real shame that the film projected with Brando in the lead - JERICHO - was never made. It was a missed op - but Brando was cracking all the mirrors in his head by the time the script was ready. A CIA epic set in Mexico - a kind of Harlot's Ghost a la Mailer. I think - feel - it would've/could've been something special. If someone like Robert Evans had been around to produce it.
The 'Murder is a Work of Art' thing. D Cammell did a TV interview with the same slogan on his T-shirt. Anyway, he was discussing the fact that art, by its very nature, can be viewed as amoral - or (in quotes) "evil." Cammell explored - we need more artists with the kahones to do that*
Iconoclast by nature - 'the only performance that really makes it is the one that achieves madness - Donald Cammell is a great subject for bio. His film roster is short, but the subject matter of his movies is worth a trillion Hollywood fallback-position CGI epics. Acute visuals, literate storylines -metaphor mash-ups that declare themselves via narrative-driven flesh-and-blood characters, The best movies are the ones he screenplayed from ground zero -PERFORMANCE - WHITE OF THE EYE (though the latter was based on a novel -DC redimentionalized it). Not forgetting Walken in WILD SIDE.
This book is a detailed attempt at Cammell (good on his mercurial persona) and his movies (great on Performance & White of the Eye). It covers the earlier auteur work, his work with unmade scripts, etc, his association with Brando and Anger and such.
It's a real shame that the film projected with Brando in the lead - JERICHO - was never made. It was a missed op - but Brando was cracking all the mirrors in his head by the time the script was ready. A CIA epic set in Mexico - a kind of Harlot's Ghost a la Mailer. I think - feel - it would've/could've been something special. If someone like Robert Evans had been around to produce it.
The 'Murder is a Work of Art' thing. D Cammell did a TV interview with the same slogan on his T-shirt. Anyway, he was discussing the fact that art, by its very nature, can be viewed as amoral - or (in quotes) "evil." Cammell explored - we need more artists with the kahones to do that*
November 20, 2014
I was recently introduced to this book by Elizabeth Hand. A dark story about the alchemy that is filmmaking-on-the-edge. It's ultimately a sad story, but also inspirational in terms of the lasting art that Cammell helped bring to the screen.
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October 20, 2019I love you Tom petty
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews