The Tulse Luper Suitcases, Part 2: Vaux to the Sea

Examine the director's aims behind the film not just the content

John Gielgud, Isabelle Pasco, Mark Rylance, and Michael Clark in Prospero's Books (1991)

Joely Richardson in Drowning by Numbers (1988)

Frances Barber in A Zed & Two Noughts (1985)

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover

Helen Mirren in The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989)

Union Générale Cinématographique (UGC)

Kathryn Hunter, Gabrielle Reidy, and Jessica Hynes in The Baby of Mâcon (1993)

Ralph Fiennes in The Baby of Mâcon (1993)

Julia Ormond

Ralph Fiennes

Philip Stone

Peter Greenaway

Plagued with infertility, the inhabitants of Mâcon are naturally involved in the spectacle that is a masque about the miracle child born to a virgin mother.

The Baby of Mâcon

Possibly the most shocking film ever!

I first made Peter Greenaway my &quot;acquaintance&quot; through &quot;Prospero&apos;s Books,&quot; an equally beautiful and equally compelling film. I have also seen some minor pictures of his, like &quot;The Belly of an Architect&quot; and &quot;Drowning by Numbers&quot; which cannot really live up to the image of &quot;The Baby of Macon.&quot; Personally, I believe it is Greenaway&apos;s best. It is a play, a performance, where shape-shifting is as spontaneous as breathing, indicating that the world is, at it were, a theater, and we the people are merely actors. &quot;The Baby of Macon&quot; is the tale of the exploitation of a child for profit. A beautiful healthy son is born into a poor family, in a time of plague and bareness, in the old Gothic city of Macon. The child is seen as a mere toy, an opportunity for gain, both by his unnamed sister (so beautifully played by Julia Ormond) and the Church. The sacred Child, identified with Christ, brings riches and prosperity and fruitfulness unto the wretched crowds who live in Macon. But his sister&apos;s over-weening ambitiousness and the Church&apos;s avarice worsen the matters. The Child is immolated and all is lost. The masque is shown on stage in a doric playhouse in 1650 AD, before the viewers whose desire for pious histrionics is forceful. In due time you cannot possibly tell whether this play is acted or merely actual. You cannot tell whether or not you are in a playhouse or in a Cathedral, or whether this wondrous baby represents an earlier Miracle, born by Virgin Birth in a Nativity in the presence of ox and ass. At the play&apos;s apogee you cannot be sure who are the players and who are the viewers. This is Peter Greenaway&apos;s most shocking film, a somber &quot;miracle-play&quot; of wonders, semi-wonders, and would-be wonders conceived in an epoch of veritable godliness, but performed in a Baroque era of Religiousness when the fancy is starving for various feelings.

I first made Peter Greenaway my "acquaintance" through "Prospero's Books," an equally beautiful and equally compelling film. I have also seen some minor pictures of his, like "The Belly of an Architect" and "Drowning by Numbers" which cannot really live up to the image of "The Baby of Macon." Personally, I believe it is Greenaway's best. It is a play, a performance, where shape-shifting is as spontaneous as breathing, indicating that the world is, at it were, a theater, and we the people are merely actors. "The Baby of Macon" is the tale of the exploitation of a child for profit. A beautiful healthy son is born into a poor family, in a time of plague and bareness, in the old Gothic city of Macon. The child is seen as a mere toy, an opportunity for gain, both by his unnamed sister (so beautifully played by Julia Ormond) and the Church. The sacred Child, identified with Christ, brings riches and prosperity and fruitfulness unto the wretched crowds who live in Macon. But his sister's over-weening ambitiousness and the Church's avarice worsen the matters. The Child is immolated and all is lost. The masque is shown on stage in a doric playhouse in 1650 AD, before the viewers whose desire for pious histrionics is forceful. In due time you cannot possibly tell whether this play is acted or merely actual. You cannot tell whether or not you are in a playhouse or in a Cathedral, or whether this wondrous baby represents an earlier Miracle, born by Virgin Birth in a Nativity in the presence of ox and ass. At the play's apogee you cannot be sure who are the players and who are the viewers. This is Peter Greenaway's most shocking film, a somber "miracle-play" of wonders, semi-wonders, and would-be wonders conceived in an epoch of veritable godliness, but performed in a Baroque era of Religiousness when the fancy is starving for various feelings.

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The Baby of Mâcon

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