Line #30 Creator/NicolasRoeg


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/image_original.jpg]]
2	[-[[caption-width-right:300:''"You should make films for the future--if you do that, the audience will catch up with you, eventually."'']]-]
3
4	Nicolas Jack Roeg, [[UsefulNotes/KnightFever CBE]] (15 August 1928 – 23 November 2018) was a British film director.
5
6	Starting in an entry-level position at a film studio, he gradually worked his way up to assistant camera operator, then camera operator (on films like ''Film/TheSundowners'' and ''Film/LawrenceOfArabia''), then finally cinematographer (''Literature/Fahrenheit451'', ''Literature/FarFromTheMaddingCrowd'', ''Film/{{Petulia}}''), before making his directorial debut (as co-director with Donald Cammell) with ''Film/{{Performance}}''.
7
8	Roeg had started working on prestige films but in the middle of the '60s, he worked on a number of British films with UsefulNotes/FrenchNewWave inspired directors, chiefly Creator/JohnSchlesinger and Creator/RichardLester, in addition to working on Creator/FrancoisTruffaut's only English-language film (''Fahrenheit 451''). Over the years he'd developed his own ideas about film being a unique medium, and the possibilities of using images, sounds and editing to tell stories in a new, provocative way. When it came time to apply those ideas as a director, the result was some of the most radical work ever released by mainstream studios, many of them experimental with narrative, and time, shooting sequences with flash-backs and flash-forwards intervowen together, and challenging a great many narrative and visual conventions.
9
10	As you'd expect from a former cinematogapher, Roeg's films are visually striking, but have so much going on they can be very disorienting; note how often MindScrew gets mentioned in the pages for his films. To say his films are an acquired taste is an understatement, but once you get used to his odd style, it's easy to see his talent. His early films are frequently considered to be among the best of TheSeventies. His later career was much less consistent. He was a considerable influence on independent film-makers from TheSeventies and TheEighties onwards, including Creator/StevenSoderbergh (his ''Film/OutOfSight'' homaged the famous sex scene from ''Don't Look Now'') as well as creators in other mediums such as Creator/AlanMoore.
11
12	He published ''The World is Ever Changing'', a memoir as well as a collection of his thoughts on filmmaking, in 2014. [[Music/TheClash Mick Jones]] was a huge fan and his Music/BigAudioDynamite hit "E=mc2" is an extended ShoutOut to Roeg's work.
13
14	----
15	!!Nicolas Roeg films with their own trope pages:
16
17	* ''Film/{{Performance}}'' (1970--co-directed with Donald Cammell)
18	* ''Film/{{Walkabout}}'' (1971)
19	* ''Film/DontLookNow'' (1973)
20	* ''Film/TheManWhoFellToEarth'' (1976)
21	* ''Film/BadTiming'' (1980)
22	* ''Film/{{The Witches\|1990}}'' (1990)
23	* ''Film/FullBodyMassage'' (1995)
24
25	!!Tropes associated with him:
26
27	* AnachronicOrder: One of his favorite techniques.
28	* BlackComedy: The humorous parts of his films lean heavily in this direction.
29	* ContrastMontage: One of the keystones of his style.
30	* CreatorCouple: Roeg and Theresa Russell, who starred in six of his films and to whom he was married for a while.
31	* CreatorKiller: He never totally recovered from ''Eureka'', which sat on [[TheShelfOfMovieLanguishment the shelf]] for a couple years, had a brief release with [[BoxOfficeBomb very little box office]], and got mixed reviews. The film has some latter-day admirers, though, like Creator/DannyBoyle.
32	* CreatorsOddball: ''Film/TheWitches1990'', a family-friendly adaptation of a Creator/RoaldDahl novel.
33	* ExecutiveMeddling: A frequent victim, with films ending up on TheShelfOfMovieLanguishment (''Film/{{Performance}}'', ''Eureka'') and films suffering BadExportForYou via edits to their American releases (''Film/{{Walkabout}}'', ''Film/TheManWhoFellToEarth'').
34	* LeFilmArtistique: He frequently and unapologetically employs symbolism and esoteric references.
35	* NonActorVehicle: Directed three of the most famous examples--''Film/{{Performance}}'' ([[Music/TheRollingStonesBand Mick Jagger]]), ''Film/TheManWhoFellToEarth'' (Music/DavidBowie) and ''Film/BadTiming'' ([[Music/SimonAndGarfunkel Art Garfunkel]]).
36	* SignatureStyle: Non-standard plots (often becoming a RandomEventsPlot or KudzuPlot). Alternating between carefully composed shots and {{Montages}}. Frequent use of FlashBack and FlashForward (visual ''and'' audio). Conspicuous use of edits and cuts (a typical film will use most of the entries from CutToTheIndex). Frank depictions of sex and violence.

Context Creator / NicolasRoeg