Greaser's Palace (1972; Robert Downey)

Greaser’s Palace (USA, 1972) 92 min color DIR-SCR: Robert Downey. PROD: Cyma Rubin. MUSIC: Jack Nitzsche. DOP: Peter Powell. CAST: Allan Arbus, Luana Anders, Albert Henderson, Toni Basil, Don Calfa, Pablo Ferro, Hervé Villechaize. (Castle Hill Films) 

Even at this remove, there is no meeting Robert Downey halfway. His films are never meant for casual viewing: one needs to work to appreciate his films that appear to be conceived by an oxygen-deprived brain, after staying awake for four straight days on a diet of coffee and wine. But if you’re willing to make the effort, and in the proper frame of mind, his best work reaps rewards.  

Downey, one of the more successful “underground” filmmakers, specialized in satires (ie- the 1966 Chafed Elbows) that managed to cross over into wider audiences, in such mainstream works as the 1969 civil rights parable, Putney Swope, and in the 1970 allegory, Pound. At first it may seem a cheat to declare Greaser’s Palace his masterpiece, since it appears as his most “above ground" (ie- digestible) film to date.  And yet, despite that it resembles an “art film” in comparison to the scruffy works that precede it, Greaser’s Palace is likewise a biting satire with an unusual story structure.

This film is also a key work in the so-called “acid western” sub genre. As coined by Pauline Kael in her review of El Topo, the “acid western” melds the western formula with the visual style and mythic feel of the spaghetti western, and Biblical, psychedelic, countercultural overtones. In some ways, this film feels like an American cousin to Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns, if viewed through Danny Peary’s clever suggestion that the frontiers in Leone’s films had existed since Biblical times. 

Allan Arbus (also in Putney Swope) plays a showman named Jessy who travels the godforsaken frontier on his way to Jerusalem where the agent Morris awaits him, however he’s always getting sidetracked to perform miracles and the like. In this clever satire, religion is compared to showmanship, and the conflict between Jesus and Pilate is due to Pilates’s ire over Jesus (dressed in vaudeville garb instead of robes) horning into his act! 

The incarnation of Pilate is one Seaweedhead Greaser (Albert Henderson), ruler of the shabby town of Greaser’s Palace, whose entourage of people blindly follows him everywhere... even to the outhouse! His daughter, saloon strumpet Cholera (played by cult actress Luana Anders) is perhaps the Mary Magdalene figure in this madness. Then there’s also some spaceman or something (played by the distinguished character Don Calfa) wearing a goldfish bowl over his head, who just might be the “God” figure. One recurring joke (worthy of Bunuel) concerns Greaser’s son Lamy Homo (name is a pun?) who keeps getting killed and then revived by Jessy. But perhaps the most show-stopping miracle of all occurs when Jessy does a song and dance number on stage in the saloon. Blood begins to pour from the palms of his hands, and suddenly agents want to sign him up!

Greaser’s Palace appears as the most “above ground” and artiest film writer-director Downey had made to date. Yet like his early underground films, it still remains a  personal work, a “family affair” (wife Elsie and son Robert Jr. appear as a massacred family), and has a complex structure. Because this picture moves quite slowly (as life would, in the old west or in Biblical times), where scenes often play in languid single takes, one may not at first notice its elaborate construction. When Jessy is on the cross, we believe we have just seen the entire film through his eyes: if you like, a Last Temptation of Jessy. 

Cinematographer Peter Powell (whose scant credits include 1973’s Let The Good Times Roll, De Palma’s The Wedding Party, and Downey’s own Rittenhouse Square) beautifully captures the “everywhere and nowhere” setting of the material. Although feels as otherworldly and allegorical as a timeless fable should, its unusual locations and unconventional characters (almost everyone has long hippie beards and top hats), are not so jarring as to take away from the ingenuity at hand. 

After the debut of Greaser’s Palace, we have seen how the media presents televangelists (to say nothing of politicians) as larger-than-life showbiz personalities. Like any timeless parable, it remains as relevant as ever.