3/25/2023 0 Comments Dark crystal 1982The final shot of the landscape shows verdant fields and shining waters where there was blasted desert. These creatures leave the planet, and allow the surviving Gelflings and Podlings to live in peace. The slaves are freed, the wounded are healed, and the Skeksis and the Mystics, who are all present at the moment, cease to exist each is revealed to be only one half of a gestalt entity. The two Gelflings, evading the Skeksis' magical creatures and the machinations of the Chamberlain (who is angling for a return to grace), achieve the palace and Jen heals the Crystal by joining it with its missing shard as the light of the three suns hits it. Jen, on his journey, meets a sage named Aughra, a grotesque, irascible but fundamentally decent individual who gives Jen the missing piece of the Dark Crystal and confesses she doesn't know what to do with it and then he meets Kira, a female Gelfling, who was brought up by the tiny, sweet natured Podlings and who also thought she was the last. The winner, the General, becomes the Emperor, while the Chamberlain, his opponent, is stripped naked and banished. (Later on, the link will become more explicit, as the Scientist falls into the pillar of fire and air that levitates the Dark Crystal, and it vaporises him, and far away one of the Mystics blinks out of existence, and the other Mystics shrug and move on.)Ī power struggle ensues, settled by a custom that involves hitting a stone with a big sword to see who chips the most off. The Skeksis, meanwhile, enter a period of crisis as, simultaneously, their Emperor dies, gracelessly, spitting hate. The eldest of the Mystics is dying before he dies, he sends Jen on a quest to heal the Dark Crystal before the three suns enter a conjunction – that is, two of the suns eclipse the third – and create the astrological conditions that would ensure that the decay caused by the Skeksis rule would endure forever. He lives with eldest of the Mystics, a community of wise but apathetic beings, one of two dwindling races who arose a thousand years ago when the Dark Crystal cracked, the other being the cruel, wasteful Skeksis, who maintain power by magic and force. Jen is apparently (so he thinks) the last of the elfin Gelflings. The world looks lived in, and everything has a history and an ecology. Every location has been built to represent an alien world with exquisite care you see the food chain in action, animals being eaten, nursing their young, going about their business. Every character is a puppet, a breathtaking practical effect in and of itself, and every puppet represents an imaginary alien being. It is set on an entirely imaginary world, and it is (I think) unique in being a live-action film without a single human. The Dark Crystal was directed, of course, by the late and much-missed Jim Henson, the creator of the Muppets. Although I don't tend to have much time for film merchandise, I own a copy of the (exquisite) art book Brian Froud produced to tie in with the film. When the VHS came out (and I was in my teens by then) I bought a copy it was one of the first DVDs I owned when I finally got a Blu Ray player I bought the Blu Ray. I of course wanted to see it again, caught rare TV showings whenever I could. I can't possibly think of anything that I might have seen in a film in my life up to then that could have been more distressing. And most distressing of all, the Podling's soul, the vital essence, as the gloating scientist explained, was distilled into a clear liquid, drip, drip, drip, which was then given to the Emperor to drink. The little creature's dark, liquid eyes turned into glassy marbles, her face became sunken, deathly. The most distressing thing I'd ever seen.Īnd it's weird, I don't really have clear memories of seeing Return of the Jedi, but I remember with crystal clarity sitting bolt upright before that big screen, the biggest I ever saw, my hands gripping the sides of the seat, coarse theatrical upholstery rough against the palms of my hands, fixed on the scene of the Skeksis Scientist forcing a Podling trapped in cruel restraints to stare into the reflected light of the Dark Crystal. But while I don't rate Star Wars all that highly these days, the other film was The Dark Crystal and that had a lasting effect. And one time it was Return of the Jedi, which for me as a kid of seven was the Undisputed! Highlight! of My Summer, Possibly My Life to Date. I was only ever taken to see two films by my mum as a kid, both at the Drake Cinema's Summer Club, where every Wednesday morning in the school hols they'd show recent films and charge 50p for kids.
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