A Eulogy For Homespun Evil

The early 1980s was surely the golden age of puppetry. (And if you don’t agree, kindly post a comment on when you think it was.) It all began with The Muppet Movie (1979), a film so obviously wonderful that I don’t need to say a word in its defense. Next, there was a certain swamp-dwelling puppet who appeared in The Empire Strikes Back (1980), and I don’t need to defend him either. Jim Henson and Frank Oz were fortunate to work at a time when computer images had not yet overtaken the possibilities inherent in mechanical props and hand-operated creatures. This is why I am wary, if open-minded, about reports of an upcoming sequel to The Dark Crystal (1982).

I saw the original movie for the first time a few weeks ago. It is not as well known as Jim Henson’s other productions, but it is arguably his most daring experiment. There are no live actors, or at least none that are visible, and every character is a puppet. Even most of the scenery consists of puppets in one form or another, creating an impression of the natural world in motion. We see plants and animals scurry, swim, wiggle and rustle inside a forest and on the floor of a desert. There are mushroom-shaped creatures playing musical instruments, and there are sentient mothballs rolling along the floors of a cave. We see puppets eating, playing, drinking, politicking, grieving. The plot is so rudimentary as to be unnoticeable (it involves a prophecy and a quest to overcome the forces of darkness) and there are so many hairs-breadth escapes, so many times when a life-saving hero is introduced out of nowhere, and so little evidence of advance preparation that would lend an illusion of inevitability to the events, that it is never possible to forget there are puppeteers behind the curtain, deciding what will happen next.

The film uses visual cues to ponder the rather elegant contrast between two ideas central to its mythology, namely the desire for power and the desire for knowledge. In the movie, the world has split between an evil race and a good race. Both of them have died out to the point that there are only ten of each left, and much of the planet has become a wasteland. The evil ones are birdlike creatures who occupy a dark castle. They are obsessed with killing and controlling other living things. There is a comic opening scene where they fight over who will be the next emperor, forgetting that they have almost nothing left to rule. The good are a wise, meditative group of scholars who live in hiding and study the cosmos. They resemble armadillos and are skilled in playing the harp. The movie appears to suggest that power is a destructive force that is meaningless to pursue for its own sake, yet some degree of power is necessary, since knowledge of the truth is useless in the hands of those without any influence.

The movie was released just before VCRs became widespread, and hence it is one of the last examples of films made with the assumption that they would be seen in the theater. Watching it today feels like you are peering through your own narrow shard of dark crystal, since it is nearly impossible to absorb it all on a tiny screen. The camera seldom bothers with a close-up, and there tends to be activity in every corner.

The cast of characters also includes several lesser species, notably the gelflings, which look like the product of marriage between elves and hobbits. It is their task to make the world whole again and fulfill the prophecy, and so on and so forth. And the sequel? We’ll see.

Comments

[Jeremy]

How could your post fail to mention the Skekses, the dark lords of the DK story! Bird-like and politically ruthless, yet inextricably tied to their religious brethren. Yes, Henson foresaw the coming of the Gingrich revolution.

[nub]

you did not see "the dark crystal" for the first time a few weeks ago. you saw it for the first time back in 2000 or 2001 when you were visiting me and diana at our old apartment. i remember this very clearly. shame, shame on you and your heartless revisionism!

anyway. the movie is a favorite of mine - a truly unique piece of art, and clearly henson's greatest achievement.

this news of a sequal dismays me. both your links above just lead to the imdb page, but i found this: it will apparently incorporate "a hybrid of live action animatronic characters and CG animation." pity. as with so many other examples of great art, part of what allowed the visual ideas in "the dark crystal" to flourish so thoroughly was precisely the limitations (and attempt to transcend those limitations) inherent to puppetry. throwing in some CG to pretty up the thing just cheapens and betrays the unique genius of the original.

RIP jim; oh how we miss you.

[nub]

damn, the link i posted didn't work. it was this: http://www.darkhorizons.com/news05/050515d.php

[nub]

the following article is a bit more heartening. i am now less dismayed than i was at first, but still skeptical (skeksescal?): http://www.mtv.com/movies/news/articles/1542247/10032006/story.jhtml

do you really not remember watching this movie with me in colorado? i remember being surprised that you hadn't seen it before, and how you really enjoyed it. *sigh*

[Avery Palmer]

To Nub, and for that matter anyone else who claims to have watched Dark Crystal with me at an earlier time: Sorry, but I have no memory of it. I will assume that in the interim, someone drank my essence.

To Jeremy: Thanks. It may not have been clear but I was alluding to the Skekses, I just omitted their name because I didn't know how to spell it. I'm not sure I agree that Newt Gingrich is "birdlike."

To Nub, again: I concur with your skepticism. I'm not suggesting that computer animation is incompatible with interesting art. Except most of the time, filmmakers just take advantage of the technology without bothering to be creative. Pan's Labyrinth was the latest movie I saw that I think incorporated computer graphics very well.