The Polymath

Cult filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky made his name with zen western El Topo, and has continued breaking boundaries ever since. Niall Kitson explores the career of a true cinematic iconoclast.

'Yesterday a kid on acid realised all matter is energy reduced to a slow vibration and that mankind is just a single consciousness experiencing itself over and over again, we are the imagination of ourselves and life is only a dream. Here's Tom with the weather.'

Bill Hicks's summary of the benefits of LSD may still raise a few smiles and knowing glances, but for cineastes everywhere there remains a form of visual stimulus as potent as any hallucinogen, as insightful as any guru and as perplexing as a Rubik's Cube – the cinema of Alejandro Jodorowsky. As an actor, writer, poet, philosopher, tarot reader, and a noted influence across the fields of film, theatre and comic books; Jodorowsky's vision remains a singular blend of religious iconography, savage violence and existential enquiry with admirers stretching from Denis Hopper to Marilyn Manson and back again. Best known for his films El Topo (1970), The Holy Mountain (1973), and Santa Sangre (1989), Jodorowsky's films are hero journeys of a most memorable kind, made all the more remarkable in the face of the director's own life and achievements to date; a veritable mystery tour filled with surreal twists, turns and misadventures. So step right up, come on inside and listen to the fantastic tale of a former clown, a riot in Mexico and the intervention of John Lennon. No refunds past this point.

The full article is printed in Film Ireland 102