The Holy Mountain

Alejandro Jodorowsky

Siren Visual

R4 Pal

Web: http://www.sirenvisual.com.au

The Holy Mountain is considered a classic of surrealistic film making, it is a strange yet alluring film mixing religious, sexual and psychedelic imagery into an experience not easily forgotten. For many years it has been primarily shown in art house cinemas and has had various video and DVD releases however many of these have been of a fairly dubious quality. While Raro Video in Italy issued a rather nice edition, its picture and sound quality is nothing compared to this superbly restored edition.

I remember the first time I saw this film in Valhalla Cinema in Glebe in Sydney (NSW, Australia) and it left a lasting impression, indeed it was from this film that my obsession with cult and underground films began !

It is great to see at last a top quality DVD release of this title. This is the complete original uncut version using the added benefit of DVD to improve the picture quality and to offer a DD 5.1 soundtrack. It has been fully restored and this really shows off its stunning cinematography, to learn more about the amazing restoration job there is a documentary on the task as an extra.

Holy Mountain opens with a Christ-like vagrant wandering the streets of a rather nightmarish world. Violence erupts around every corner, skinned carcasses on poles are paraded down the streets, and people are gunned down only to have birds fly from their wounds. After many bizarre and unusual episodes, including a circus of frogs and salamanders re-enacting the conquest of Mexico and the vagrant's body being cast, moulded, and duplicated hundreds of times, he eventually completes his pilgrimage and ascending a giant tower emerges in the dwelling of an enigmatic master, played by Jodorowsky himself.

The master then introduces the vagrant to seven of the most influential and powerful people in the world, all with their own tale of lust and greed. (These seven people are related to the seven planets and there is strong alchemical and astrological content throughout the film).

The first person owns a factory that manufactures bodily accessories for the living and the dead. Living people can have masks made to make them look like anyone they want to. Dead people can have electronic devices implanted that allow them to kiss their loved ones goodbye from their coffin, or even participate in their own funeral.

The second person operates a factory for weapons and biological warfare. This includes bombs, anti-matter waves, and mind-altering drugs. They also produce a line of guns based on different religions, psychedelics, and rock music.

The third person manufactures paintings and artwork created with arses and genitalia. He has also constructed a giant, interactive "love machine" that is titillated and penetrated by a giant rod, is capable of orgasm, and reproduction.

The fourth person makes anti-Peruvian war toys, including a comic book entitled Captain Captain. She also indoctrinates children to hate and kill their future enemies.

The fifth character is a financial advisor to the President. He claims the only way to save the country's economy is to exterminate 4,000,000 of its citizens over the next five years. The President agrees, ordering the installation of gas chambers, gas schools, gas libraries, gas whorehouses, etc.

The sixth person is the sadistic Chief of Police who has a sanctuary of 1,000 testicles in jars.

The seventh and final character is an architect who passes the idea of eliminating homes for workers and poor people and makes profit by selling them shelters without heat, water, or kitchens. He proposes that workers shall be conditioned to eat at the factory and only sleep in the coffin-shaped shelters to roaring applause.

After these mind-boggling vignettes, the master tells a tale of nine immortal men who live on top of a Holy Mountain and control life as we know it. The master will put the eight individuals through rigorous conditioning so they can conquer the mountain and gain the secret to immortality. These nine immortal men are related to the spheres of the Tree of Life in Cabbalistic mysticism and again we see the underlying esotericism Jodorowsky has encoded into the film.

The film's final act includes scenes of a man eating a live horse, a man who walks through metal, a tree covered with dead chickens, more castration, and, unbelievably, a man with milk-spurting cat heads as breasts.

The Holy Mountain is certainly one of the strangest and unusual films ever made. On one level it is simply a strange surreal exploration of sex, violence and the modern world and as a work of art and surrealism is extremely effective and powerful. It has a strange and alluring quality and uses imagery which could be said to resonate with the content of the unconscious. For this reason it has always been controversial and confronting and if you are easily offended by a mixture of sex, violence and religion then this is not a film for you.

On another level it is encoded throughout with religious, alchemical, astrological and Cabbalistic imagery which means everything has a double meaning. Numbers have great significance throughout the film as does colour and the use of animal forms. Jodorowsky’s inspiration, as is clear from the documentary on the Tarot, comes from the Western Occult Tradition. He is extremely knowledgeable in the fields of alchemy, Kabbalah, Number mysticism as well as the works of Aleister Crowley and G.I. Gurdjieff. The climax of the film and the use of the image of the Enneagram has strong Fourth Way resonances. This is as much a journey through the occult underworld as it is an art film.

To fully appreciate the Holy Mountain, one has to appreciate Jodorowsky’s vision. This is not a lineal experience, while there is a plot of some sort, it is primarily a film to be experienced rather than simply watched. This is little dialog and one must be willing to flow with imagery, at times shocking, at other times inspiring, to gain the full experience. Expect to watch this film numerous times to really gain some appreciation of its meaning.

This edition from Siren Visual for Region 4 PAL is impressive, not only does it offer a restored edition with superb sound but is packed with significant extras. These include a great commentary by the director, deleted scenes (also with commentary), trailer, the tarot with a commentary and a doco on the restoration process.