PUZZLE OF A DOWNFALL CHILD is about a famous fashion model who's burnt out on the business and moved to a cottage by the sea to reflect on her splintered life. Years of being treated as an object by photographers, stylists, agents, etc., has left her with a serious identity complex and an addiction to pills...although flashbacks show that she was somewhat unhinged to begin with. The film isn't really that good; as critic Pauline Kael noted when the film came out, "I have a constitutional aversion to movies about women whose souls have been lost, stolen or destroyed, especially when it isn't made clear -- and it never is -- whether the heroine had a soul in the first place." But what IS very special about the movie is simply the way that Dunaway LOOKS. Rigged out in precise red lipstick, false eyelashes and liquid eyeliner, she's meticulously photographed by director Jerry Schatzberg, a former lover and onetime fashion photographer. The story is inspired by the true life life of Anne Saint Marie, a fashion model who later came unglued. Schatzberg taped conversations with Anne Saint Marie and used her comments as a framing device for the story. Not a great film, but an interesting one nevertheless.
Puzzle of a Downfall Child
1970
Drama
Puzzle of a Downfall Child
1970
Drama
Plot summary
Fashion photographer turned director Aaron Reinhardt (Barry Primus) visits a withdrawn colleague at her windswept island cottage. By taping conversations with former model Lou Andreas Sand (Faye Dunaway) and developing her story for film, Aaron hopes "to help her put the fragments together, to sort out and focus on the reality."Flashback several years to the arrival of prim, high strung Lou (nee Emily Mercine) in Manhattan. After bowling over agent Peggy McCavage (Shirley Rich),the gorgeous, feline-looking Lou is an immediate success in the fashion industry. Still, she's frantic with fear about her work, becoming neurotically dependent upon pills, young friend Aaron, and possessive photographer Pauline Galba (Viveca Lindfors). Lou agrees to marry art director Mark (Roy Schieder),but sabotages the relationship by standing him up at the alter.Increasingly erratic and temperamental, Lou's position as a top model begins to slip. More is revealed about her past, in which we see that the unstable beauty may have been molested as a teenager, either by a wealthy older man or a priest. Lou is so afraid of her own desires that she either picks up anonymous men in bars, or makes men she's already involved with pretend to be strangers before going home with them.Lou's paranoia increases, further alienating her coworkers. She's hospitalized after trying to seduce her psychiatrist, then leaves the fashion business to move to a remote beach house off the New England coast. We return to the present, where Lou sees the visiting Aaron to the ferry. She asks him why, since they were such well suited as friends, they never actually had an affair. The confused Aaron answers that they DID indeed have an affair, leaving Lou to puzzle over her fragmented memories.
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Movie Reviews
FASHION MODEL HITS THE ROCKS
Faye Dunaway beyond the verge...
Not exactly surreal but still nearly completely devoid of a real story-line. Faye Dunaway is a highly successful model who goes off the deep end, leading to a self-imposed isolation that she can't seem to get out of. In what is a genuinely phenomenal performance, Dunaway is emotionally stripped bare. In some ways, her acting here recalls Jane Fonda's work in KLUTE. There's a lot of angst beneath some very thin skin. The supporting cast includes Viveca Lindfors, Roy Scheider (as Dunaway's hot headed boyfriend) and Barry Primus, in his film debut. From a script by Carole Eastman with some really odd direction by Jerry Schatzberg. The movie bends time and jumps back and forth as Dunaway's past is revealed. It's bleak but never depressing.
Great Dunaway Performance
Faye Dunaway has always been my favorite actress and this movie provides a great showcase for her talents. She plays a very neurotic model who cannot even trust her own memories. The movie is done in a non-narrative style that was fairly common in the 1970s, with events shown out of order, and that device is used very effectively to portray the protagonist's instability. This is one of the overlooked movies from a period that produced many great and challenging films; I don't believe it's ever even been on video.