Wikipedia

Equus(film)

Equusis a 1977psychological drama filmdirected bySidney Lumetand written byPeter Shaffer,based on his1973 play.The film starsRichard Burton,Peter Firth,Colin Blakely,Joan Plowright,Eileen Atkins,andJenny Agutter.The story concerns a psychiatrist treating a teenager who has blinded horses in a stable, attempting to find the root of hishorse worship.

Equus
Theatrical release poster
Directed bySidney Lumet
Screenplay byPeter Shaffer
Based onEquus
by Peter Shaffer
Produced byElliott Kastner
Lester Persky
StarringRichard Burton
Peter Firth
Jenny Agutter
Joan Plowright
Colin Blakely
CinematographyOswald Morris
Edited byJohn Victor-Smith
Music byRichard Rodney Bennett
Production
company
Winkast Film Productions
Distributed byUnited Artists
Release dates
  • 14 October 1977(1977-10-14)(United Kingdom)
  • 19 October 1977(1977-10-19)(United States)
Running time
137 minutes
CountriesUnited Kingdom
United States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$4 million[1]

Lumet's translation of the acclaimed play to a cinematic version incorporated some realism, in the use of real horses as opposed to human actors, and a graphic portrayal of the blinding. Despite some criticism of this approach, the film received positive reviews, with awards for Burton, Firth and Agutter.

Plot

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Hesther Salomon, a magistrate, asks her platonic friend Martin Dysart, a disillusionedpsychiatristwho works with disturbed teenagers at a hospital inHampshire,England, to treat a 17-year-old stable boy named Alan Strang after he blinded six horses with asickle.With Alan only singingTV commercial jingles,Martin goes to see the boy's parents, the non-religious Frank Strang and hisChristian fundamentalistwife Dora. She had taught her son the basics of sex and that God sees all, but the withdrawn Alan replaced his mother's deity with a god he called Equus, incarnated in horses. Frank discloses to Martin that he witnessed Alan late at night in his room, haltered andflagellatinghimself, as he chanted a series of names inBiblical genealogy-fashion which culminated in the name Equus as he climaxed.

Martin begins winning the respect and confidence of Alan, who shares his earliest memory of a horse from when he was six and a man approached him on a horse named Trojan. Alan imagined the horse spoke to him, and said his true name was Equus, and this was the name of all horses. The man took Alan up on Trojan, which the boy found thrilling, but his parents reacted negatively and injured him taking him off the horse. Martin also meets the stable manager, who reveals Alan secured his job through another employee, Jill. Devastated at the horses' injuries she indirectly caused, Jill has taken medical leave.

Eventually, Alan admits to Martin that he would secretly take horses away from the stables at night to ride them nude, chanting prayers to Equus until he reached orgasm, after which he caressed them lovingly. Martin envies the boy's passionate paganism, in comparison to his own empty life, where he has ceased intimacies with his wife and is plagued by nightmares of ritualistically slaughtering children inHomer's Greece, wearing theMask of Agamemnon.Given an aspirin serving as aplacebo"truth drug",Alan further reveals that one evening Jill tempted him to go to a Swedish pornographic film at a local cinema, where he was shocked to see his father, who forced him to leave the cinema. After Alan went back with Jill to the stables, she stripped and offered him sex but he was unable to perform and, although she was sympathetic, told her to leave. Naked, and tormented that Equus sees all and is a jealous god, he blinded the horses.

Martin is left troubled by the fact that he can treat Alan to take away his pain but in the process will deprive the boy of his passion, leaving him as emotionally neutered as Martin himself.

Cast

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Production

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Development

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DirectorSidney Lumetsaw the playEquuswhen it was first performed in London between 1973 and 1975, and also saw productions withAnthony PerkinsandRichard Burton.[2]Lumet found that Perkins' performance was excellent, but felt the stage productions failed to capture the conflict of the character Martin Dysart, which he believed was meant to represent writerPeter Shaffer's inner turmoil.[2]

Shaffer and Lumet spent more than one year preparing the screenplay before filming began.[3]Much of the dialogue in Shaffer's play is preserved, accurately, in the screenplay.[4]

Marlon BrandoandJack Nicholsonwere considered for the part of Dysart in the film version. However, Burton's stage performance won over audiences, despite concerns about hisalcoholism.[5]

Filming

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In stage productions, the horses are portrayed by human actors, often heavily built, athletic men wearing tribal-style masks.[5]Lumet did not believe this could adequately be done in a film version, concluding a degree of realism was required, "because the reality he [Alan] was being watched in was going to create the dilemma within him".[6]For horse-related stunts, the filmmakers consultedYakima Canutt,who had previously worked on almost all ofJohn Wayne's earlywestern films.[7]The horse riding and blinding scenes were shot initially in natural light before moving to unrealistic lighting, to capture conflictingApollonian and Dionysianworld views.[6]With cinematographerOswald Morrisand production designerTony Walton,Lumet developed a complex colour scheme avoiding easily identifiable colours, preferring to combine colours to emphasise duality.[8]

The scene where Firth rides the horse nude was filmed in one take, in an uninterrupted shot lasting four and a half minutes.[9]Whereas the blinding scene was done inpantomimeon stage, Lumet opted to graphically display it to convey the horror. Much of the footage shot depicted the horses' heads morphing into faces ofJesus,Dora Strang and Frank Strang, and a glimpse of aBalinese dagger.However, Lumet decided this was unsubtle and cut much of this, only keeping the dagger to portray ancient impulses.[3]

Despite being a British and American production set inHampshire,England, filming took place entirely in and aroundOntario, Canada.[10]The scenes in the stable and Alan's room were filmed in theToronto International Film StudioinKleinburg,while downtown Hampshire was doubled withGeorgetownandHalton Hills.[11]The Strang family house was a real house located in theTorontosuburb ofRiverdale.The film was produced during the height of the "tax shelter era" of Canadian filmmaking, in which foreign producers flocked to the country in order to take advantage of theCapital Cost Allowancewhich allowed investors to deduct up to a 100% of a film's budget provided it met certain requirements. That, combined with the value of theCanadian dollarand abundance of cheaper crew and locations than those found abroad, led to a boom period in Canadian filmmaking.[12]

Reception

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Critical reception

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Richard Burton's performance received positive reviews, earning him a nomination for theAcademy Award for Best Actor.

Lumet acknowledged that the film was "very vulnerable to attack", and critics were bound to ask why a film was needed when the play was "perfect", but initial reviews were "respectful".[2]Roger Ebertgave the film two and a half stars, arguing the realism in actual horses and their blinding, "strangely enough, get in the way of the play's own reality: the obsession that the two characters come to share"; however, Ebert complimented Burton and Firth on their performances.[13]Vincent Canby,chief critic forThe New York Times,wrote that he preferred the theatricality of the stage production, but "Now, after seeing Sidney Lumet's comparatively realistic film version, it's possible to appreciate Mr. Shaffer's text for what it is— an extraordinarily skillful, passionate inquiry into the entire Freudian method". Canby also found the movie's realism excessive, and said that "the movie exhausts us with information", specifically citing the scene where Alan rides a horse bareback as giving the viewers "anticlimactic detail". Canby also concluded "This is the best Burton performance sinceWho's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"[14]Molly Haskell's review inNew Yorkremarked that the film came "not a moment too soon" for fans of the play,[15]and that Burton was eloquent, Firth "brings out the ugly and unpleasant qualities of the boy", whileJenny Agutter"is rudely treated as the girl who, in another of those preposterous conventions of sixties [sic] movies, offers herself nude to the sensitive youth only to have him spurn her".[16]Jesse Kornbluth, writing forTexas Monthly,called the film "an unqualified success", even though he felt the play was only of interest to "middle-brow" audiences.[17]

English Professor James M. Welsh felt using real horses in the film was understandable, but argued the outdoor scenes infringed on the "abstract theatrical design" that gave the play its creativity.[4]Welsh also felt the explicit blinding was "potentially repulsive", and "much of the spirit of the play is lost as a consequence".[18]

The film received generally positive reviews, currently holding a 70% rating onRotten Tomatoes,based on 23 reviews.[19]In 2005, theAmerican Film InstitutenominatedRichard Rodney Bennett's music forAFI's 100 Years of Film Scores.[20]

Accolades

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Award Date of ceremony Category Recipient(s) Result Ref(s)
Academy Awards 3 April 1978 Best Actor Richard Burton Nominated [21]
Best Supporting Actor Peter Firth Nominated
Best Adapted Screenplay Peter Shaffer Nominated
BAFTA Awards 1978 Best Screenplay Nominated [22]
Best Supporting Actress Jenny Agutter Won
Joan Plowright Nominated
Best Supporting Actor Colin Blakely Nominated
Best Music Richard Rodney Bennett Nominated
Golden Globes 28 January 1978 Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama Richard Burton Won [23]
Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture Peter Firth Won
National Board of Review 19 December 1977 Top Ten Films Won [24]

References

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  1. ^"AFI|Catalog".
  2. ^abcApplebaum 2006,p. 74.
  3. ^abApplebaum 2006,p. 76.
  4. ^abErskine & Welsh 2000,p. 111.
  5. ^abSmith, Richard Harland."Equus (1977)".Turner Classic Movies.Retrieved24 October2016.
  6. ^abApplebaum 2006,p. 75.
  7. ^Barlow 2008,p. 301.
  8. ^Applebaum 2006,pp. 75–76.
  9. ^Cunningham 2001,p. 30.
  10. ^"AFI|Catalog".catalog.afi.com.Retrieved23 January2020.
  11. ^Applebaum 2006,p. 77.
  12. ^"Tax Shelter Films | The Canadian Encyclopedia".www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca.Retrieved23 January2020.
  13. ^Ebert, Roger (9 November 1977)."Equus".Rogerebert.com.Retrieved23 October2016.
  14. ^Canby, Vincent (17 October 1977)."'Equus': Film of a Different Color ".The New York Times.Retrieved23 October2016.
  15. ^Haskell 1977,p. 91.
  16. ^Haskell 1977,p. 92.
  17. ^Kornbluth, Jesse (December 1977). "The Two Horsemen of Sidney Lumet".Texas Monthly.p. 152.
  18. ^Erskine & Welsh 2000,p. 112.
  19. ^"Equus (1977)".Rotten Tomatoes.Retrieved25 January2024.
  20. ^"AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores Nominees"(PDF).Archived fromthe original(PDF)on 6 November 2013.Retrieved6 August2016.
  21. ^"The 50th Academy Awards (1978) Nominees and Winners".Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.Retrieved1 April2012.
  22. ^"Film in 1978".British Academy of Film and Television Arts.Retrieved23 October2016.
  23. ^"Equus".Hollywood Foreign Press Association.Retrieved23 October2016.
  24. ^"1977 Award Winners".National Board of Review.Retrieved23 October2016.

Bibliography

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  • EquusatIMDb
  • ‹ThetemplateAllMovie titleis beingconsidered for deletion.›EquusatAllMovie
  • EquusatRotten Tomatoes
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