Fantasia Obscura: “Eyes Without a Face”
There are some fantasy, science fiction, and horror films that not every fan has caught. Not every film ever made has been seen by the audience that lives for such fare. Some of these deserve another look, because sometimes not every film should remain obscure.
Although sometimes, an unseen film can leave a very large shadow…
Eyes Without a Face (1962)
(Director: Georges Franju)
As the Sixties started, the popularity of Hammer horror films was reviving interest in the genre beyond England and the United States; the French were also anxious to see such films on their screens. The fact that the French, who were in the middle of Le Nouvelle Vague as such masters as Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut gave French film a reputation for mastery of image and bold storytelling appreciated the world over, wanted horror films like those being done at Hammer, the way a chef in a three star Michelin restaurant wants a mac and cheese, says something about the appeal of those pictures.
Producer Jules Borkon optioned the novel Les Yeux sans Visage from Jean Redon, hoping to provide domestic product that would scratch that itch for that mac and cheese, and then made the dish with brie when he got Georges Franju to direct. Franju’s career started back in the 1930s, during which time he formed the archival organization Cinematheque Francaise before his work was interrupted by World War II. When he resumed, he built his reputation on such documentaries as Le Sang des betes and Hotel des Invalides, films that subverted their subjects and gave them an unexpected spin. When Eyes Without a Face came out in 1960, it was Franju’s sixteenth film, but only his second feature.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGNFynNqJ2A
And this feature was unlike any horror film released to that point, less Edgar Allen Poe than Jean Cocteau. The story follows Doctor Genessier (Pierre Brasseur), a surgeon of considerable skill and repute who shows great compassion for his patients, and even some regret for the young ladies who he has to kill for their faces. Yes, he kidnaps and kills young women, with the help of his assistant Louise (Alida Valli), in order to harvest their faces so that he can graft them to his daughter Christiane (Edith Scob), who was badly disfigured in a car accident caused by pere and kept hidden away by him until he can give her a face that stays on without necrotic decay setting in.
Had Doctor Genessier been more careful, or had he not loved his daughter so much, there would not be as much death and dismemberment as we see, including one scene where we watch an operation where the doctor removes a victim’s visage in graphic detail that caused audiences in France to faint.
American audiences never had 
a chance to show that they were made of sterner stuff; when released here, dubbed in English and under the title The Horror Chamber of Dr. Faustus, these scenes were cut, along with scenes of Doctor Genessier being compassionate on his rounds, which diminished the film in its initial release. The original version would find only limited audiences after its initial exhibition until 1986, when retrospectives of Franju’s career were mounted in London, bringing the film to a wider audience.
In the years since its initial release, some artists found themselves heavily influenced by the film. John Carpenter suggested years after he finished Halloween that Michael Myer’s white, featureless mask was inspired by the featureless disguise Christiane wears between face transplants, while critics have suggested that John Woo’s classic thriller Face/Off shared more than just the facial transplant surgery gimmick with Franju’s film, as both shared the motif of doves in flight at crucial scenes.
And then there’s Billy Idol’s number, “Eyes Without a Face.” Even though the song shows no direct influences with either the plot of the film or the score composed for it by Maurice Jarre (which was one of his earliest efforts), Idol claims he was inspired by the film to pen this single, which charted as high as #4 on the Billboard charts on release, to the point where the film’s French title is the verse sung by the backup singers:
What’s amazing is that the film had such agency despite its limited distribution and lack of availability. No one could have guessed in 1960 that the movie would find a much bigger audience all those years later. Voilá cinéma…
NEXT TIME: The wrong place at the wrong time: Not the usual description for a Ray Harryhausen film…
