![]() ![]() You can't take your eyes off "Doctor Faustus"-and, for fear of missing anything, you wouldn't want to. The film has the same late-'60s, hallucinogenic quality of the other-worldly "Barbarella" (and no wonder: both pictures were made in Rome under the auspices of movie mogul Dino de Laurentiis). Elizabeth Taylor's intermittent (and mostly silent) entrances and exits as Helen of Troy probably do the picture more harm than good, but Burton is in fine form (after an unsure start) and Andreas Teuber cuts a striking figure as the Devil's Aid. The art direction, production design, and cinematography are all first-rate, with pop-art colors insanely, imaginatively blended together like bewitched Jell-O powder. Marlowe's poetry, like subterranean Shakespeare, seems to flow naturally from Burton, and the combination of soliloquy and performance is a lively one. He makes a pact signed in blood, with the evil spirit Mephistopheles, to sell his soul to the devil. ![]() Despite a warring of conscience in which saints and demons both attempt to sway Faustus to their side, the conflicted doctor signs his soul over to the Devil in exchange for lust and power, quickly discovering the black magic not living up to its promise. The play’s tragic hero, Faustus, is a brilliant German scholar who feels he has reached the limits of divine academic learning, and devotes himself to the study of magic. Richard Burton co-produced, co-directed, and stars in this adaptation of Christopher Marlowe's play "The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus", concerning an aged 16th century German scholar who conjures up Mephistopheles, servant to Lucifer. ![]()
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