The Cinematheque

“As bonkers as it is beautiful.”

Geoff Dyer

Theresa Russell, Art Garfunkel, and Harvey Keitel head the cast of Nicolas Roeg’s kinetic, erotic psychological thriller, which uses a jigsaw-puzzle narrative to relate a steamy tale of sexual obsession and violence. Garfunkel is Alex, a young psychoanalyst lecturing at the University of Vienna. Russell is Milena, the married American woman with whom Alex is having a torrid affair. Keitel is Netusil, a police inspector investigating the circumstances that have landed Milena in hospital. Alex’s libidinous and perhaps unreliable memories vie with the detective’s fantasized version of events as Roeg’s narratively-discontinuous film spins its complex tale. The result—praised as ​“the ultimate detective film,” denounced as tasteless and misogynist, and originally X‑rated—is a fascinating meditation on the relationship between psychoanalysis, detection, and voyeurism—and a darkly disillusioned view of human nature and human understanding.