I saw the film version of John Fowles's novel The Magus when it came out in 1968 and rather liked it. I don't think the critics did, and I don't think did well at the box office. Michael Caine calls it one of the worst movies he has appeared in. In fact, it is generally rated a bomb (though it does have a cult following). Anyway, a few weeks ago I finally got around to seeing it again, thanks to Amazon's instant video. And having done so, I am inclined to agree with Caine.
I honestly don't know what I saw in it all those years ago. Actually, the thing from it that remained with me was something I was familiar with long before I saw the movie — the T. S. Eliot quotation at the end:
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Maybe that is what made me think the film amounted to more than it did.
Yesterday, I had another disappointing experience with something I once admired. Debbie and I went to see Léger: Modern Art and the Metropolis at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Léger was one of the first modernist artists whose work I really liked, perhaps because I spent the first eight years of my life surrounded by factories, warehouses, and railroad yards. Industrial landscapes still appeal to me.
Unfortunately, judging by the show at the museum Léger doesn't seem to have done much with his initial insight. The later works look much the same as the earlier ones. Worse, by the time you get through the exhibition and seen the films and heard the music (George Antheil and Eric Satie) it all seemed dated, a gathering of period pieces, an idea about the city, not a portrayal of it. The bright spots were some wonderful paintings by Robert Delaunay, sparkling engagements with life.
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