Wagner as Hitler, Ringo Starr as the pope, and an anatomical anomaly that suggests someone misheard Liszt being described as Europe's biggest pianist – this film just gets worse and worse
*Lisztomania* (1975)
*Director:* Ken Russell
*Entertainment grade:* Fail
*History grade:* Fail
Franz Liszt (1811-1886) was a Hungarian composer. He became famous across Europe as a pianist.
*Fame*
Franz Liszt (Roger Daltrey) is at a party. "Liszt, my dear fellow!" says a fellow composer. "Oh, piss off, Brahms," Liszt sneers, and adds to his companion Richard Wagner (Paul Nicholas): "He's a right wanker." This is the high point of both intellectualism and wit in the film's dialogue. Afterwards, Liszt plays the piano to a throng of screaming teenagers. In the 1840s, long before Elvis, Beatlemania or Justin Bieber, Heinrich Heine coined the term "Lisztomania" to describe the hysteria of Liszt's fans. Women shrieked, swooned, took cuttings of his hair, collected the dregs from his coffee cups, and even kept the discarded stubs of his cigars between their bosoms.
*Romance*
In real life, Liszt took up with Princess Carolyne von Sayn-Wittgenstein in 1848. In this film, she is a maniacal dominatrix bat-demon with inverted crosses dangling from her nipples. It's something of a one-sided portrayal. Liszt dons a crinoline and plucks a lyre. Sex-crazed women grab at his skirts. He develops an erection bigger than himself. As his member nears eight feet in length, evil Princess Carolyne prepares a guillotine for it. This isn't an attempt at historical accuracy: just an alarming glimpse into director Ken Russell's mind. Or possibly he misheard someone describing Liszt as Europe's biggest pianist. Lisztomania may be the most embarrassing historical film ever made. Wait! It gets worse.
*People*
Wagner gloats that his music will bring forth "a man of iron, to forge the shattered fragments of this century into a nation of steel". He grows fangs, bites Liszt on the neck, sucks his blood, then snogs his daughter Cosima. The real Cosima Liszt left her husband for Wagner, though it didn't happen like this and nobody was a vampire. Liszt and Carolyne try to get married, but the pope is having none of it. The pope is a little beardy bloke with a heavy Scouse accent. Good grief. The pope is Ringo Starr. Since he can't marry Carolyne, Liszt takes religious orders. Pope Ringo sends him to exorcise Wagner.
*Politics*
Wagner – dressed, in a painful literalisation of Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra, as Superman, complete with red cape – strums an electric guitar and sings about restoring the Teutonic godhead. Like Dr Frankenstein, he has created a monster. It is Rick Wakeman (who himself created the monstrous prog-rock soundtrack), done up as Thor. In real life, Nietzsche broke his friendship with Wagner over the religious tone of the composer's opera, Parsifal. Wagner's revenge was to tell Nietzsche's doctor that the philosopher's headaches were caused by excessive masturbation. A condition one would imagine the makers of this film understood only too well.
*Prejudice*
Wagner was a great composer and a nasty piece of work. He was outspokenly anti-semitic, and it is hardly a mitigating factor that many others in the music world at the time also held these obnoxious views to some degree. Liszt's own feelings about Jewish people, while not so actively hateful, weren't exactly friendly either. Still, Lisztomania goes a bit far in blaming the existence of Nazism and the rise of Adolf Hitler entirely on Wagner. He died in 1883, six years before Hitler was born.
*War*
Wagner is squished beneath his own castle. During his funeral, he rises from his swastika-embossed tomb. In case you haven't yet absorbed Ken Russell's silly point that Wagner is Hitler, Wagner is now actually dressed as Hitler. His electric guitar turns into a machine gun and he rampages around the city, killing Jews. It's played for laughs. It doesn't get any. Liszt – who is also now dead – climbs into a heavenly spaceship, flies back to earth and laser-explodes Zombie Vampire Hitler Wagner. The end. Thank goodness.
*Verdict*
Can't think what went wrong with this one. Nineteenth-century composer plus a spaceship, comedy zombie Hitler, Pope Ringo, and a giant penis: it must have sounded so good on paper. Reported by guardian.co.uk 10 hours ago.
*Lisztomania* (1975)
*Director:* Ken Russell
*Entertainment grade:* Fail
*History grade:* Fail
Franz Liszt (1811-1886) was a Hungarian composer. He became famous across Europe as a pianist.
*Fame*
Franz Liszt (Roger Daltrey) is at a party. "Liszt, my dear fellow!" says a fellow composer. "Oh, piss off, Brahms," Liszt sneers, and adds to his companion Richard Wagner (Paul Nicholas): "He's a right wanker." This is the high point of both intellectualism and wit in the film's dialogue. Afterwards, Liszt plays the piano to a throng of screaming teenagers. In the 1840s, long before Elvis, Beatlemania or Justin Bieber, Heinrich Heine coined the term "Lisztomania" to describe the hysteria of Liszt's fans. Women shrieked, swooned, took cuttings of his hair, collected the dregs from his coffee cups, and even kept the discarded stubs of his cigars between their bosoms.
*Romance*
In real life, Liszt took up with Princess Carolyne von Sayn-Wittgenstein in 1848. In this film, she is a maniacal dominatrix bat-demon with inverted crosses dangling from her nipples. It's something of a one-sided portrayal. Liszt dons a crinoline and plucks a lyre. Sex-crazed women grab at his skirts. He develops an erection bigger than himself. As his member nears eight feet in length, evil Princess Carolyne prepares a guillotine for it. This isn't an attempt at historical accuracy: just an alarming glimpse into director Ken Russell's mind. Or possibly he misheard someone describing Liszt as Europe's biggest pianist. Lisztomania may be the most embarrassing historical film ever made. Wait! It gets worse.
*People*
Wagner gloats that his music will bring forth "a man of iron, to forge the shattered fragments of this century into a nation of steel". He grows fangs, bites Liszt on the neck, sucks his blood, then snogs his daughter Cosima. The real Cosima Liszt left her husband for Wagner, though it didn't happen like this and nobody was a vampire. Liszt and Carolyne try to get married, but the pope is having none of it. The pope is a little beardy bloke with a heavy Scouse accent. Good grief. The pope is Ringo Starr. Since he can't marry Carolyne, Liszt takes religious orders. Pope Ringo sends him to exorcise Wagner.
*Politics*
Wagner – dressed, in a painful literalisation of Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra, as Superman, complete with red cape – strums an electric guitar and sings about restoring the Teutonic godhead. Like Dr Frankenstein, he has created a monster. It is Rick Wakeman (who himself created the monstrous prog-rock soundtrack), done up as Thor. In real life, Nietzsche broke his friendship with Wagner over the religious tone of the composer's opera, Parsifal. Wagner's revenge was to tell Nietzsche's doctor that the philosopher's headaches were caused by excessive masturbation. A condition one would imagine the makers of this film understood only too well.
*Prejudice*
Wagner was a great composer and a nasty piece of work. He was outspokenly anti-semitic, and it is hardly a mitigating factor that many others in the music world at the time also held these obnoxious views to some degree. Liszt's own feelings about Jewish people, while not so actively hateful, weren't exactly friendly either. Still, Lisztomania goes a bit far in blaming the existence of Nazism and the rise of Adolf Hitler entirely on Wagner. He died in 1883, six years before Hitler was born.
*War*
Wagner is squished beneath his own castle. During his funeral, he rises from his swastika-embossed tomb. In case you haven't yet absorbed Ken Russell's silly point that Wagner is Hitler, Wagner is now actually dressed as Hitler. His electric guitar turns into a machine gun and he rampages around the city, killing Jews. It's played for laughs. It doesn't get any. Liszt – who is also now dead – climbs into a heavenly spaceship, flies back to earth and laser-explodes Zombie Vampire Hitler Wagner. The end. Thank goodness.
*Verdict*
Can't think what went wrong with this one. Nineteenth-century composer plus a spaceship, comedy zombie Hitler, Pope Ringo, and a giant penis: it must have sounded so good on paper. Reported by guardian.co.uk 10 hours ago.