Mr. Crowley

We all know heavy metal music demands that its hypnotized, denim clad, tattooed, brain dead followers sacrifice homeless people to Satan. And skin cats. That goes without saying. What you may not know is that it also makes some pretty good reading suggestions. Inspired by various metal songs, I've read Dante's "Divine Comedy," Hemingway's "For Whom the Bell Tolls," Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner," Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land," and the stories of H.P. Lovecraft and Edgar Allan Poe, among others. I've read many books after hearing a song and being curious enough about a subject such as Jack the Ripper, Countess Bathory, Lizzy Borden and Gilles De Rais to hit the library or, more recently, to scour the web in search of information on these fascinating historical figures. However, for whatever reason, I never read much about Aleister Crowley. And I consider myself a pretty big Ozzy fan. So when I came across a huge ad for a film called Crowley in a recent issue of "Revolver" magazine, I figured here was my chance to brush up on a guy to which the Great Wizard of Ozz had deemed worthy of dedicating an entire tune. And a damned good one at that. And upon, further study of the credits, I discovered that the screenplay had been written by none other than Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson (with some help), for cripes sake! How could it get any better than this?

Well, it gets better than this, thankfully.

First the good stuff. Simon Callow, who plays a stuttering college professor who may or may not be possessed by the spirit of occultist Aleister Crowley, a bisexual drug addict with some disturbing sexual fetishes, is all kinds of fun to watch. He chews the scenery real hard, first as the bumbling college professor, then as the self-assured deviant who rampages through (fairly) modern day England. This perf alone is worth the rental. The rest of the leads pass most cringe tests, even if they offer uninspired performances in many cases. The scene that opens the film with two young men visiting the elderly Crowley at his home on the day of his death actually had me wishing they had flashed back to the actual events of Crowley's life, rather than the fictional nonsense that follows.

As best I could make out, a computer program is designed for creating a virtual reality of sorts. But to engage in the reality, the user must gear up in what looks like a 1930's deep diving suit. Somehow, Callow's character, while in this suit, is possessed of Crowley's spirit, whether in actuality or by electronic means, and Crowley is again unleashed on an unsuspecting public. As far as I could tell, the real life Crowley was never implicated in any murders, but the new Crowley soon is on a homocidal rampage, and dispatches a hooker and the leading lady's room mate. I never thought I'd hear myself say this, but the murders actually seem quite unneccesary. Sexual humiliation and degradation would have been enough here, and Crowley's foul perversities would seem even more devastating had his victims been allowed to live with them.

The over the top lecture scene , in which the possessed professor perverts the Bard, ends with him urinating on some horrified students unlucky enough to be sitting in the front row (another reason to pick a seat in the back row at lectures.) There's also a scene in which we get a nice close-up of the dean's desk which has been adorned with Crowley's defecation. In a later scene, we get to see a seance participant wetting herself in a manner that would make a horse jealous. It's all been done before, and yet still somewhat shocking, but to what use? Salo, an Italian shock film from the mid-seventies, made vigorous use of the human excretory system to mixed results, and partially camouflaged the fact that there was little else going on in the film. The material here seems to be quite disturbing and voluminous, and if used correctly, could yield a very rewarding film. It's too bad scenes like this got past the cutting room.

Overall, this film is worth checking out. Not to learn anything about the titular character, but for the tour-de-force performance by Callow, who should be getting some beefier roles. 2 out of 5 stars. Here's hoping that some young filmmaker sees this and decides he want to make a truly biographical film about one of the twentieth century's more fascinating characters.