EYES OF LAURA MARS: Blu-ray (Columbia, 1978) Indicator/Powerhouse

The era of ‘trash cinema’ likely reached its zenith with director, Irving Kershner’s Eyes of Laura Mars (1978) – whose hit-or-miss sophistication masks a very pedestrian ‘thriller’ in which the eponymous, smut-peddling clairvoyant/photographer is about to get a taste of her own medicine. Originally begun with an entirely different star in mind – Barbra Streisand, who had the good sense to bow out, though not before recording the title track, ‘Prisoner’, used as the movie’s preamble to the main titles (a sad, if slightly sinister ballad, co-written by Karen Lawrence and John Desautels), Eyes of Laura Mars is as ridiculous as it remains a raunchy spectacle, starring Faye Dunaway. Superficially, Laura Mars has the world at her feet; an adoring throng of sycophantic followers, including her cloistered entourage, promoter/agent, Donald Phelps (Rene Auberjonois), and queerly devoted chauffeur, Tommy Ludlow (Brad Dourif), a fashionable Manhattan penthouse and closet-full of this year’s uber-impractical runway fashions, plus, a burgeoning romance with John Neville (Tommy Lee Jones) – ostensibly, the ‘good cop’ who takes a protective stance after several of Mars’ colleagues turn up with their eyes gouged out. Alas, the target appears to be Mars herself – mercilessly stalked by an unknown assailant. Eyes of Laura Mars would have something going for it, if it didn’t muddle its premise almost from the get-go; Mars, able to ‘witness’ the killings as premonitions – even, experience her own stalking as a hallucination, but never to see the actual killer’s face, inferring – at least, for an interminable amount of run time - that Mars herself might actually be the serial slasher, using her telepathy as a ruse to throw the police off her scent. Actually, this would have made infinitely more sense to the stock/schlock finale, concocted by David Zelag Goodman, based on a better idea by John Carpenter. But no, we are instead treated to a series of backstage parties and photog/fashion premieres to chronically deflect and diffuse the tension – merely to elongate a story that could have played as an hour-long movie of the week, with far more genuine fatalism to augment its suspense.  

Given its myriad of shortcomings, Eyes of Laura Mars was a sizable hit in ‘78, earning $20 million against its $7 million outlay, a veritable – if hardly artistic – triumph over the critic’s general discontent with the picture, capped off by The New York Times’ Janet Maslin who called it ‘dumb’ while, in tandem, praising its ‘cleverness’. I suppose we ought to give Maslin a nod for her ‘bright’/‘stupid’ snap analysis here. Eyes of Laura Mars even inspired a Mad Magazine parody, ‘Eyes of Lurid Mess’ that, ironically, reads far closer to the truth of what we get on the screen here. And, you know you have officially achieved pop culture immortality when Mad Magazine tackles you. Dunaway’s heroine is a contradiction; on the one hand, the forthright purveyor of photographic ‘torture porn’ she professes as making a statement against the sexualized violence permeating pop culture a la then contemporary society. Her detractors find her images of bare-chested super models, heavily make-upped in fur coats and stilettos while tugging at each other’s teased out tresses or standing over the strewn corpses of tuxedo-clad men – presumably in full pimp mode – rather disgustingly lowbrow. And indeed, John Neville is among those who find nothing of merit in such garish displays of cavorting and contorting human ‘meat market’ flesh. Laura’s Achilles Heel is perhaps her ex-husband, Michael Reisler, played with seedy aplomb by Raúl Juliá – his hand, chronically in Mars’ cookie jar, stretched out for more hush money. But actually, Mars has bigger concerns. A remarkable number of her favorite models, including Doris Spenser (Meg Mundy), Michele (Lisa Taylor, and Lulu (Darlanne Fluegel) are dying at the hands of a mysterious serial killer.

John Carpenter’s original 11-page treatment for Eyes of Laura Mars was optioned by producer Jack H. Harris, who aspired to make the movie independently with Roberta Collins as his star. Instead, Harris’ pal, Jon Peters read the treatment and immediately saw its potential as a vehicle for his then-girlfriend, Barbra Streisand. Brokering a deal with Columbia exec, Peter Guber, Streisand almost immediately thereafter pulled out, leaving Columbia with enough enthusiasm to move forward on the project on one condition: that the screenplay be completely overhauled by David Zelag Goodman.  Carpenter later reflected that his lack of cache in the film industry was what tanked his prospects to develop the script himself, and heavily criticized Goodman for taking virtually all of the suspense out of his original story, going for the jugular in cheap violence instead. And Carpenter was not the only reluctant witness here, sincerely disappointed with the picture’s outcome. Faye Dunaway, who could be counted upon to be difficult, quickly found reasons to be disenchanted and clash with Peters while shooting in New York and New Jersey. Despite her protestations, it was all in the can 56 days later, leaving Dunaway with nothing to do but cash her check and go home, feeling the movie had somehow failed to live up to her expectations. And indeed, the usually enigmatic Dunaway, herein, gives one of her worst performances of her career – in some scenes, stilted to the point of paralysis, while in others, overly grand in her panicked gesturing, and woefully desperate to have her fanciful Sylvia Brown-esque predictions taken seriously by anyone – even the police.

Dunaway’s performance is far too self-involved to convey the passion of this misguided artiste, giving ‘an account of the times in which I'm living’ - replete with ‘moral, spiritual and emotional murder.’ Oh, now that’s deep! So far, I will give Laura Mars her due. The seventies were hardly a decade of love-ins. But can’t Ms. Mars see her contributions to ‘jiggle’ sexploitation are simply promoting more of the same by out-kinking the competition? The Columbus Circle shoot, as a prime example, is a cesspool of tasteless devil-may-care degeneracy for its own sake, incongruously wed to Mars’ particular brand of ultra-gritty non-realism; two overturned cars on fire, barking Dobermans, and a perverted catalog of fetishistically-clad sex creatures, tugging and tussling in their patent-leather pumps. It all smacks of the ‘art house’ porn then decorating 42nd St. cinemas and men’s clubs along the Great White Way. Naturally, this heightened display triggers another episode in Laura’s psychic cacophony. She witnesses the murder of Sheila Weissman (Marilyn Meyers) and, after cancelling the shoot, clumsily inveigles herself in the police investigation by confessing to as much; then, having to explain herself in great detail to officers, Sal Volpe (Frank Adonis) and John Neville, who aren’t buying her story. So, the whole cast and crew gets carpet-hauled to the precinct; Neville, running everyone’s priors to unearth Tommy’s criminal background. Poor Tommy – the most devoted of this fair-weather bunch, forced to lay bare all of his priors for the frenzied Laura, who cannot handle one more revelation as her car takes her home.

From this predictable vignette, the movie only becomes more insincerely contrived and silly. Laura suffers more intermittent visions to habitually derail her hopes to get back on track. Another photo shoot at her studio facing the pier is wrecked when she manages to blindly race through the otherwise abandoned building and right into Neville’s arms. Tommy Lee Jones, looking light eight miles of bad road and goony to boot, is out of touch as Mars’ protector, and, so we discover in the climax, for very good reason (more on this in a moment). So, the plot – such as it is – moves into the foreseeable fornication to take the edge off middle act; Laura and John, consummating their awkward affections for one another. We go through the motions and the mechanics – followed by a soul-searching walk amidst the autumn foliage after the earth-shattering double homicide and funerals of Lulu and Michele; the serial killer’s latest prey. It all adds up to nothing, as Laura prepares to attend Donald’s birthday bash; then, laughably bribes him into impersonating her to throw Volpe off the scent while she goes sleuthing in a different direction. Alas, the killer’s next victim ought to have been Laura Mars. So, instead, Donald meets with his untimely end inside an elevator, leaving Laura even more abandoned and shell shocked than ever.

The best performance in the picture is owed Brad Dourif’s scruffy, but dutiful chauffeur, who becomes Neville’s prime suspect after discovering a veritable shrine to Laura in Tommy’s apartment. Of course, Tommy denies any wrong-doing…and why not? He’s innocent. Meanwhile, at Laura’s penthouse, the maven of this Maison is once again terrorized by the real serial killer. Mercifully, the killer’s attempts to break in are delayed by Laura having the wherewithal to deadbolt the door. So now, in the starkness of day, the murderer swoops onto her balcony Errol Flynn style, smashing through the patio glass and be revealed as none other than John Neville. To assuage Laura’s terror – but also, to prevent her from bolting out the front door, Neville lies about Tommy being the real killer. Knowing Tommy as she does, Laura realizes John is lying to her now and catches him using ‘I’ in his sentences, thus revealing him to be the murderer. As Neville spews forth some disposable verbal diarrhea about his own life’s story, Laura comes to accept that he is mentally ill and may, in fact, be suffering from schizophrenic episodes.  Ergo, he kills when he is not himself. How convenient! Her jittery hysteria having subsided, John now pulls his service revolver. But instead of shooting Mars, he gives the gun to her, pressing it against his own abdomen and imploring her to pull the trigger to put him out of his misery.  After much consternation, Laura obliges and shoots her lover dead, calmly telephoning the police as the camera zooms in on a close-up of her careworn eyes and the Streisand angst-ridden ‘love ballad’ again soars over the end titles.

The ending to Eyes of Laura Mars is so absurdly nonsensical, contrived and cliché-riddled, it affirms a scene played much earlier in the picture, between Dunaway of Jones, in which, in preparation for their passionate flagrante delicto, shot by cinematographer, Victor J. Kemper, with that cheaply erotic seventies’ verve for half-lit sex scenes, she giddily whispers, ‘It’s terrifying’ to which he suggests, ‘It’s beautiful’ instead. Tragically, at least for Dunaway’s disarming shutterbug, she got it right the first time. Viewed today, Eyes of Laura Mars is certainly no Klute (1971). I would not even put it ahead of Ed Bianchi’s woefully undernourished gay/camp cult classic, The Fan (1981), which should give a general understanding of my low-ranking opinion of this movie herein. There is no escalation of the thrill factor, but a lugubrious repetition of the carnage; over and over again – scantily clad sex kittens, middle-age frumps, an ex-husband and a middle-aged queen buy the farm.  Yada, yada, yada…and boooooring. Shot through heavy diffusion filters, these crimes are barely revealed, without any full throttle violence. Instead, we are repeatedly shown Laura’s witness to a few gruesome aftershocks. Yet, even these do not satisfy or ratchet up the terror and thrills. So, what we are left with is a tale of two people – Laura and John – each, in their own way, utterly disconnected from reality and doomed to remain isolated and alone. If Eyes of Laura Mars were a love story – good, bad, indifferent or even fractured, we could almost forgive this oversight. But the picture is marketed as a ‘crime thriller’ for which director, Kershner seems to have forgotten is sole purpose is to make our skin crawl. In the last analysis, Eyes of Laura Mars is more sad than grim, and, awfully ill-favored to say the least.

Eyes of Laura Mars has been afforded two Blu-ray releases; a ‘bare bones’ from Mill Creek, featuring only an audio commentary from its director, and, a more lavishly appointed release from Indicator/Powerhouse in the U.K. that is also region free, and includes, along with Kershner’s ramblings, a 14 min. appreciation by Kat Ellinger, a vintage ‘making of’ barely lasting 7 min., a reflection piece from 1999 (8 min.) and a 4 min. appreciation by David DeCoteau, plus image galleries. It’s all lipstick on the same pig, because both editions of Eyes of Laura Mars sport the same flawed 1080p transfer, framed in 1.85:1, but plagued by a dated master, likely prepared with the DVD era in mind and never upgraded since. While day scenes exhibit acceptable clarity and accurate, if hardly exemplary color fidelity, showing a modicum of fine details, much of the movie – shot in less brightly lit conditions, or under the cover of night, suffers from a heavy haze and thicker-than-anticipated patina of film grain. The whole image has a fuzzy, under-exposed quality, fine detail disappearing beneath a murky veil. Flesh tones appear natural. But the entire color palette is anemic at best. The LPCM mono audio is adequate for this presentation. But the visuals are decidedly disappointing. I’ve noted in the past that a lot of the old Columbia catalog – currently owned by Sony – is being farmed out to third-party distributors like Indicator with little to no regard from Sony for quality control; a policy that flies in the face of Grover Crisp’s usual attention to detail when Sony Home Entertainment elects to release their own product to hi-def themselves. Exactly how much my appreciation for this awkwardly assembled humbug would have improved if the image had been stellar is debatable. True enough, the better a movie looks the more likely one is apt to set aside its narrative shortcomings. But in the case of Eyes of Laura Mars, I won’t lament the fact we did not get a better 1080p master. This movie did nothing for me. Pass and be very glad that you did.

FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)

2

VIDEO/AUDIO

2.5

EXTRAS

Indicator 3.5

Mill Creek 1