#16 From the Twitter archives, part 2: Point Blank

John Boorman’s memorable 1967 thriller.

Point of departure

Point Blank (1967) was one of JG Ballard’s favourite films—one wonders if it was a principal influence on his ‘concrete and glass’ period. For a Hollywood film it’s remarkably bizarre and alienating (a good thing). It’s a tale of settling scores that begins in an abandoned Alcatraz.

The Rock

The hero, Walker, is a career criminal who’s been betrayed by his friend & his wife and left for dead. They’ve taken his share of some loot. Somehow Walker survives being shot and staggers out of the eerie prison, into the waters of San Francisco bay. Presumably he manages to swim to shore.

Geometry of retribution

Walker then sets about tracking down Reese (‘friend’) and Lynne (wife), all the while claiming, “all I want is my money”. Once on his mission, he never shows any emotion. He’s as hard & indifferent as the concrete landscape of modernist blocks, freeways & storm drains surrounding him.

Interpretations

Given the apparent implausibility of Walker surviving being shot by Reese, and furthermore making it across the Bay, one question sometimes raised about this film is whether the events are really happening. Is it all taking place in Walker’s head as he lies dying in the cell?

Flowers of Hades

Alternatively, perhaps Walker’s already dead, and the San Francisco and LA he wanders through are actually the Underworld. A number of disorientating, surreal scenes where time appears to become disjointed point to something being not quite right in Walker’s reality.

Not digging it

Walker’s quest at one point leads him to a psychedelic nightclub, and I read this sequence as sardonic commentary on the 60s counterculture. There’s a black ‘singer’ inanely entertaining some businessmen, and Walker gets into a fight, dispatching one heavy with a punch to the balls.