Bliss, Movie Review
A recent television showing of this Australian
film, based on the best selling Peter Carey novel, has inspired me (if that is
the right word) to start a whole new category of Movie Reviews. I was looking
forward to seeing this 1985 film again after many years, it being one of the
most innovative and quirky of Australian movies, and a great book. Does it stand
the test of time? Well, yes and no. Carey wrote the story while living in the
hippy enclave of Bellingen in northern New South Wales, and the film is very
much of its time.
The grand themes of Bliss are the contrasting
values of the quest for wealth and prestige verses the simple life of the bush
dwelling hippies of the era. Harry Joy, a basically good bloke who likes to spin
a yarn, runs a successful advertising business, has the house, the Jaguar, and
the wife and kids - and all should be well, but he also has the near fatal heart
attack which precipitates dramatic change in his life. The out of body
experience during the attack brings about a change of consciousness in Harry's
life, bordering on madness and paranoia, but also very revealing in relation to
his wife's affair with Harry's business partner, the drug taking and incest of
his children, and ultimately, leading to doubt about the values he has held so
dear throughout his working life, particularly when he discovers that most of
the products he promotes cause
cancer.
Harry leaves home and moves
into a penthouse, where he drinks to excess and explores his core values with
his business pals. He also phones for a call girl, who turns out to be the
beautiful Honey Barbara, a hippy lady who has come from her bush retreat to sell
her body for the good of her commune (the unlikeliest of values for a new-ager
in my opinion). Harry and Honey B are attracted to each other, and she suggests
that he should move into the bush with her. Meanwhile, Harry's wife and her
lover arrange for Harry to be consigned to a hospital for the insane. Through a
mix-up of identities, Harry's other friend and business associate is also
committed, and they end up in the same room under the same name.
Eventually Harry's wife, Bettina,
helps Harry to leave the institution after they pay some money to the corrupt
woman supervisor. Harry has to agree to help sell the advertising creations of
his wife, and in the more open relationship they are now living in, Honey B
moves in with them. Bettina has always dreamed of making it big in New York, and
with Harry's help is well on the way to achieving her goal. Honey B, however,
soon becomes disillusioned with the bickering family, and with Harry's reversion
to the corporate world. She packs up and returns to her bush
haunt.
Bettina visits her doctor, and
is casually informed that, owing to her life long proximity to petrol, (her
father was a garage owner) she has contracted terminal cancer, and has less than
a year to live. Bettina's business associates are curious when they see two
mysterious objects in large paper bags sitting in her place at the table. When
she enters the room, she pulls off the bags to reveal two large bottles filled
with petrol. "We sell petrol, which causes cancer" she announces, and lights the
wicks, killing them all.
Harry now
leaves home, and dumps his jag in the bush as he goes off to find Honey B,
lumping a single suitcase. She rejects him, but Harry stays nearby, planting
trees non-stop, and building his own bush dwelling. After eight years, Honey B
finds that her bees are collecting honey in autumn, normally a barren period,
because of the type of trees Harry has been planting; an eight year love letter
to Honey B, who returns to his arms.
The final scene shows Harry as an old
man, who has been relating the whole story to his daughter, aged about twenty,
Honey B having passed on. Harry leaves the house, and while wandering through
the bush, is killed when a branch of one of the trees he has planted falls on on
him. Unlike the horrific experience of his heart attack and the fear it
produced, Harry merges into the forest after his
death.
The film stands up very well
after twenty five years, and has recently been produced as an opera. Perhaps the
most annoying aspect of the film in my opinion, is that, although healthy
living, good food, and the threats of cancer are prevalent throughout the
story, and a major part of the plot, all of the characters seem to be smoking
throughout the film, right down to the finish as Harry's hippy daughter
chain-smokes her way through their final conversation. Did the filmmakers not
know in 1985 that smoking causes cancer?
Posted: Mon - March 22, 2010 at 12:08 AM
