FIGURES IN A LANDSCAPE
UK,1970, 110 minutes, Colour.
Robert Shaw, Malcolm Mc Dowell.
Directed by Joseph Losey.
Figures in a Landscape is a lesser known Losey film, made after his Boom- Secret Ceremony years and just before his new success with The Go- Between.
Written by Robert Shaw (a novelist and playwright as well as a prominent actor), it is a piece for two actors, an experimental kind of film, obviously symbolic and puzzling. Two prisoners escape, are pursued and reach a border. They are not characters in their own right, but figures in a landscape through which they pass, helped by it and more often hindered by it. The landscape (and the visual beauty with which it is filmed emphasises this) is as much a character as the men. Interaction of the men on each other and on the landscape, and vice-versa, is what the film is about. It can be summed up in the word 'freedom'.
All Losey films are worth seeing and exploring. Robert Shaw is generally an abrasive actor and is so here. Malcolm Mc Dowell (after If...and The Raging Moon and pre A Clockwork Orange and O Lucky Man) is more sympathetic. Photography is superb.
1. The title suggests a limit to our point of view on the two central characters Much of the photography of the two men illustrates this and sometimes the landscape takes over. What is the meaning of the limitation of the title? What conventions for interpreting the film - dream, symbol, allegory - does it impose? In view of this, how successful is the film?
2. Comment on the uniting of the men and the particular landscapes - hostile or friendly (or eventually, both) that the men pass through. Does this add to the film's meaning?
3. Where did the director place the audiences’ point of view and its sympathies - close to the men, with the men, at times (from the helicopter) chasing the men? What did this do to your response?
4. The anonymity of the escape and the focus on the themes of escape and freedom? The effect of the pursuing and swooping helicopter (how evil, menacing, impersonal), the faceless, masked men pursuing, the masked guards? Who were the 'enemy'?
5. Did the dialogue illustrate the themes well, or was it too symbolic?
6. The two men - the significance of their tied hands -
- Mac Connachie - build up a picture of his character, his past, courting, attitudes to life and freedom; the escape, dominating Ansell, instinctive and brutish, cunning, murderous. What redeeming qualities did he have?
- Ansell - young, loud-mouthed about his short past, dependent, dominated, more sensitive, yet eventually killing. How much did he understand? What did the two characters have in common? How were they shown to be opposites, one commenting on the other? Who was the better man? Why?
7. What bonds had grown between the two men by the time their hands were untied? Why did Mac Connachie help and save Ansell?
8. The meaning of Mac Connachie's death? Why did he turn round and fight his war? Why did he not survive the escape? Why did Ansell survive?
9. Was this effective cinema? Was it an effective parable or a piece of misguided, pretentious preaching?
