# Gothic (1986)

### reviewed by
Jerry Saravia

Ken Russell's "Gothic" is one of the crudest, most excessively overwrought, unimaginably worst films ever made - a travesty of the memory of Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, Lord Byron and anyone else involved in that hallucinatory evening back in the summer of the early 1800's. Yes, the film purports to be about that evening but I am sure it was a lot classier and civilized than Russell's version of it.

Not to say that it was not a sexual, druggy romp for all involved, as I am sure it was, but this often looks like wild outtakes from "Woodstock" crossed with "Caligula." Natasha Richardson is the tranquil Mary Shelley, Julian Sands is the laudanum addict Percy Shelley, and Gabriel Byrne is the laughably miscast, brutish, devilish Lord Byron, in exile at the Villa Diodati where all the hanky-panky takes place. Also on hand is the highly loony Dr. Polidori (Timothy Spall) and Mary's stepsister (Miriam Cyr), who all indulge in debauchery (free love as Percy calls it), and hallucinatory fever dreams where reality and fiction sort of cross over. There are snakes (a typical Russell visual), corpses, stillborn babies, hands puncturing nails, abortions and lots of sex. The question is that in all of Russell's mishmash of fiery, bloody images, when did Mary creatively think of her idea for "Frankenstein" or Polidori think of his "Vampyre" story? The film only shows the hallucinations b! ut precious little time is invested in any of the characters. They are vapid, one-dimensional cartoons in Russell's universe, and the fact that these literate minds read horror stories to each other during a brutal thunderstorm is only barely hinted at. It's all fire and brimstone played to the hilt, and likely to bore anyone to tears who is not interested in a Heavy Metal music video with Thomas Dolby's overused electronic score groping for our attention.

"Gothic" has the stylish look of a rock video but none of the atmosphere or subtlety of a Universal horror flick. It sputters, spits itself out in stylistic strokes and tries to thrill us with nightmarish overkill, but it ultimately fails to enlighten. I admired some of Russell's other visionary trips but "Gothic" is strictly subterranean junk.

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