A delightful way to twitch his first English language venture and Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blowup is as vaunting watch of the remarkable times of swinging 60’s of London. It’s a tense and provocative film about perception and voyeurism in a stringy blend of murder mystery through a very sight of stylish look at the world of fashion. The film has been an exciting theme ever made and still is a yardstick for many filmmakers who thoroughly enjoy the visual delight of Antonioni.
Blowup, made in 1966- The story is about a fashion photographer, played by David Hemmings, who believes he might have witnessed a murder and unwittingly taken photographs of the killing. Antonioni’s first entirely English-language film, starring the sophisticated Vanessa Redgrave, Sarah Miles, John Castle, Jane Birkin, Tsai Chin, and Gillian Hills, and the famous sixties model Veruschka. The screenplay was written by Antonioni and Tonino Guerra, with English dialogue by British playwright Edward Bond. The film was produced by Carlo Ponti, who had contracted Antonioni to make three English-language films for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (the others were Zabriskie Point and The Passenger).
Nevertheless, the plot was inspired by Julio Cortázar’s short story, “Las babas del diablo,” with its diegetic music by Jazz pianist Herbie Hancock. Blowup is still relevant with those vibrant thrills and even after 50 years of its release. Antonio’s depiction of sex, drugs, and rock’n’roll of swaying city in its charm. A sight of the world of fashion, a provocative murder mystery that examines the existential nature of reality interpreted through photography.
The plot set in the mid 60s London, a locale reasonably unfamiliar to the director, though distinguished at the time for its trends, including The Beatles, stick-thin fashion model Twiggy, and the styles at Carnaby Street. Anything less is a treat & more is a milestone in liberal brashness. Oh yes, this movie nippily turned out to be one of the most dominant films of the 20th century, and it was Michelangelo Antonioni’s first international box-office success. The defiance and expressions of sexuality went as far to be the first British film to display full-frontal nudity
The film was nominated for two Academy Awards with no wins for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay (Michelangelo Antonioni, Tonino Guerra, and Edward Bond). Howbeit won the 67’s Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. The movie could be a pompous film-making or serious cinematic art. Whatever the inspiration is, upto the audiences to choose. The film critic Andrew Sarris in the Playboy magazine said the movie is “a mod masterpiece”. The other prominent critic Arthur Knight wrote that “Blowup would be as important and germinal a film as Citizen Kane, Open City, and Hiroshima, Mon Amour — perhaps even more so”. Time magazine called the film a “far-out, uptight and vibrantly exciting picture” representing a “screeching change of creative direction” for Antonioni- The magazine predicted it would “undoubtedly be by far the most popular movie. Antonioni has ever made.”
The flick opens in the era of swinging London- subsequent to the scene shown is the group of happy street mime carousers in any open Jeep careening through the streets. The white-faced and masked groups of pranksters get drunk and run through the streets swamping automobiles and their drivers with their charity boxes. In contrast, a group of impoverished men leaves Camberwell Reception Centre, a hostel for the homeless. Then you have a high-fashion photographer Thomas (David Hemmings), dressed like a tramp, walking through a block or two to the parked Rolls Royce convertible and carrying his expensive camera in a brown paper bag. A step further, his face looks tired and casual to his lucrative career of glamour photography. On the side is a complete about-face, routes photographing with his Nikon F (supposed to be the world’s first 35mm SLR camera) in a genuine documentary style, the seamy and sordid side of life London- involving its bums, poverty-stricken individuals, slums and asylum seekers.
Thomas leaves the studio, the two teenage girls aspiring to be models (Birkin and Hills) speak to him, but the photographer walks out in a hurry driving his car. Then again, you see him wandering into Maryon Park, capturing photos of two lovers. The woman (Vanessa Redgrave) notices and is furious at being photographed. Thomas then meets his agent for lunch, sees a man looking into his car. In his studio, Redgrave arrives asking for the film, but he deliberately hands her a different role. She, in turn, writes a false telephone number to him. Soon after, in his darkroom checks the negative roll, but are grainy, seem to show a body in the grass and a killer lurking in the trees with a gun. The tired Thomas is disturbed by a knock on the door, but it is the two girls again. He sends them back and asking them to see him tomorrow.
As evening falls- Thomas goes back to the park and finds a body, but he missed out on the camera with him. Feeling scared of a twig breaking and possibly being stepped on. Thomas back at his studio to find that all the negatives and prints are disappeared except for one very grainy Blowup showing the body. After driving into town, he sees Redgrave and follows her into a club where The Yardbirds, featuring Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck on guitar, are seen playing. Soon after, at a drug-drenched party in a house close to the Thames near central London, finds Veruschka, who had spoken of going to Paris, and when defied, she says she is in Paris with her agent (Peter Bowles). But Thomas cannot put across what he has pictured. Waking up at sunrise in his home, not clear though drives to the park alone and unable to find the body there.
Baffled and confused, Thomas watches a mimed tennis match that’s drawn his attention. He picks up an imaginary ball and throws it back to the players. While he watches the mime, with the sound of the ball, Thomas is transported to the melancholic mode of the mimed match alone on the lawn. His image fades away, leaving only the grass as the film ends.
You have a primeval appeal in this movie. The tone layered with the engrossing visuals is something unique, which only Angelo can flair those glows, enhancing command in the brilliant camerawork of Carlo Di Palma. The assertion of his technic and its accuracy is also something to be discussed. The sixties backdrop of London is stunningly consumed. And. This mere backdrop remains a perfect universal theme. Yet, there is no other film quite like it. Well, Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘The Conversation’ can be traced its roots to this film.
The audience to date appreciates the end credits of Blowup- notwithstanding a full-paced thriller or a portrait of swinging isolation of our lives. Voluminous of what it’s about- The discussion of this film is often a focus on what it’s not about. Suppose this could be an easier way for the expressions rather than questions to ponder. The urban landscape, the cultural savory of the city, unconcerned and casual. The impudence and the mode of disrupting pictures, and so it’s about the murder. So many ways of getting mislead by the expectations with our familiarity with conventional plots.
Yes, Blowup defies expectations. Yet, the flowing image captures any less a skewed perception of reality than our vision at the moment? Indeed, this is not about to mediate an absolute answer, ultimately can’t distinguish it. By nature, a muse for a possible solution
Film Crew
Directed by Michelangelo Antonioni
Produced by Carlo Ponti & Pierre Rouve
Written by Edward Bond (English dialogue)
Screenplay by Michelangelo Antonioni & Tonino Guerra
Story by Michelangelo Antonioni
Based on “Las babas del diablo” by Julio Cortázar
Starring: David Hemmings; Vanessa Redgrave & Sarah Miles
Music by Herbie Hancock
Cinematography Carlo Di Palma
Editing by Frank Clarke
Studio: MGM; Bridge Films
Distributed by MGM Premier Productions
Release dates:18 December 1966 (USA) & 29 August 1967 (UK)
Running time: 110 minutes
Country: Italy; The United Kingdom & United States
Language: English
