‘Lost and Found’ is an ongoing column, wherein I discuss a noteworthy movie that for whatever reason has never been released on DVD, or is otherwise unavailable for my viewing pleasure.
I know that “500 Best Movies You MUST See Before You Die!” type books are pretty lame, but I keep getting them as gifts, and they make for good toilet reading. I was flipping through Phaidon’s “The Movie Book” one day when I came across this bizarre still of Roger Daltrey and a lady friend – post-coital – inside the back of a piano apparently being played by Wagner:
There was something very strange afoot. I did some digging, and I was right: something very strange indeed. The still is from a movie called Lisztomania!, directed by Ken Russell (who also did The Who’s Tommy) in 1975. As near as I can tell, it’s about the life of famed Romantic composer Franz Liszt, told as a rock opera. Aparently at some point, Liszt and his buddy Richard Wagner die, but then Wagner comes back from the grave as a Nazi vampire. So Liszt has to take some sort of heaven-spaceship back to earth to save the world from Nazi vampire Wagner.
Also, Ringo Starr plays the Pope.
And Rick Wakeman plays Thor.
And if all that doesn’t have you dying to see this movie, this will:
Many people who have seen this movie don’t seem to care for it too much, but I just don’t see how it could be bad. I mean, did you see that trailer? Unfortunately, it’s only available on DVD in England on Region 2 encoded DVD right now, though that itself was a fairly recent development, possibly suggesting that a Region 1 DVD might not be far behind. I’m keeping my fingers crossed. In the meantime, if any kind soul out there has a bootleg of this hanging around somewhere, please share!
