PAUL MORRISSEY
(1938 - ), American



"Paul Morrissey got his start in film working as Andy Warhol's assistant in the Factory, but as a consequence of Warhol's notorious laziness and willingness to delegate artistic duties, Morrissey rapidly progressed to complete artistic independence--scripting, directing, and photographing many of the works which are still sometimes misattributed to Warhol. [...] In all of these works (but especially in the extraordinary trilogy Flesh, Trash, and Heat) Morrissey so completely removes the normal melodramatic scaffolding that Hollywood films employ to organize experience that a new kind of drama emerged: a dramatic language of nervous twitches and tics, of idiosyncratic gestures and speech patterns, of bizarre pathos. Morrissey has made a number of public statements over the years about the politics behind his work (he says he is an arch-conservative who is appalled by the wasted lives of his characters and disgusted by the drug culture many of his films depict), but if we trust the tale and not the teller, a different story emerges--not one of shock and disgust, but of fondness for his characters. Especially in masterworks like Trash and Flesh, what comes through is not a series of negative judgments, but the opposite: Morrissey clearly relishes the expressive idiosyncrasy and eccentricity of his figures."
- Ray Carney, The First Thirty Years of American Independent Cinema

"Paul Morrissey may be America's most undervalued and least shown major director. In a career spanning more than twenty years he has made more than a dozen feature films of consistent weight and moral concern, with a distinctive aesthetic. [...] Morrissey’s humanist morality is clear in his respect for his performers and his submission to their intuitions and revelations. Morrissey by reflex embraces the sinner even as he condemns the sin. His obsession is not with the spectacle of squalor but with the pathos of a wasted humanity. If he returns and returns to intense images of the sordid life, it is in the spirit of the Juvenalian satirist, who feels so passionately the horror of his vision that he rages against the folly he surveys. Morrissey is no more hypocritical in his moral focus than Swift was, another intensely moral man given to scabrous representation of the corruptions of his time. The reiterated rigor and and consistent morality distinguish Morrissey from Warhol’s aesthetic nihilism."
- Maurice Yacowar, The Films of Paul Morrissey (Cambridge)

"Paul Morrissey's works can stand comparison with anything else the cinema today has to offer. [...] He has produced a cinema of complete human acceptance: however odd the characters are, they are never patronized, never made fun of, never presented as material for a quick camp giggle. [...] Morrissey belongs to that select band who make films in such a way that the film becomes a transparent envelope, through which we can enter, telepathically, into their minds."
- John Russell Taylor, Directors and Directions: Cinema for the Seventies


FILMOGRAPHY
1961 Ancient History (Short)
1961 Dream and Day Dream (Short)
1962 Mary Martin Does It (Short)
1962 Civilization and Its Discontents (Short)
1963 Taylor Mead Dances (Short)
1964 Peaches and Cream (Short)
1964 Like Sleep (Short)
1964 Sleep Walk
1964 Merely Children (Short)
1964 About Face (Short)
1964 The Origin of Captain America (Short)
1965 All Aboard the Dreamland Choo-Choo
1965 My Hustler [Co-Directed With Andy Warhol]
1966 Chelsea Girls [Co-Directed With Andy Warhol]
1967 **** (Four Stars) [Co-Directed With Andy Warhol][/i]
1967 The Loves of Ondine [Co-Directed With Andy Warhol]
1967 Imitation of Christ (1967) [Co-Directed With Andy Warhol]
1968 Lonesome Cowboys [Wrote, Co-Directed With Andy Warhol]
1968 Flesh
1970 Trash
1971 Women in Revolt
1972 Heat
1973 L'Amour
1973 Flesh for Frankenstein
1974 Blood for Dracula
1978 The Hound of the Baskervilles
1981 Madame Wang's
1982 Forty Deuce
1985 Mixed Blood
1985 Beethoven's Nephew
1988 Spike of Bensonhurst
2010 News From Nowhere

Recommended First Watch: Trash

Definitely Trash

Trash was amazing, probably my favorite movie of the 70's now.

I'm glad someone else finally saw it and, best of all, loved it! Have you seen Flesh as well?

No, I haven't checked for any of his other films on Netflix. There's still a few choice films I need to get around to finishing. Also, I'm worried that Flesh is going to be the same movie (it sounds the same) as Trash, just with a different set of people, and that would ruin the experience (of Trash) for me.

Nah, watching Flesh will make you appreciate Trash more the next time.

That makes it sound like it's a shittier movie, but I'll still keep an eye out for it.

Update: Netflix also has Flesh. I watched a little bit last night, but was too tired to keep going. I might even need to start it over, cause I was dosing in and out. Unfortunately, I won't be able to get started with that for a while cause my girlfriend's kid sister is visiting and we only have the one tv.

So far, it seems less character driven than Trash and more focused on cinematic aspects.

It's a less in-your-face movie in general. I really like it though...

So, just finished Flesh and goddamn it seemed really short. I was only expecting it to be halfway through by the time it was done.

Anyway, I really wish I would've watched this before Trash. It seemed with this film, the guy was only experimenting with his technique and Trash was meant to be the finished product. The whole thing just seemed more contained and less refined, the characters were less interesting (the artist and Joe were the only ones that I found intriguing) and it wasn't as funny to me. The only part that really floored me was the scene at the beginning with his baby. So, in comparison with Trash, I'd give this a 7, but on its own, I'd give it an 8.

So this leaves to wonder what the fuck's up with Heat. Unfortunately, it's not on Netflix.

Where can I find his films online?

Trash and Flesh were both on Netflix. Not sure about now.

I check for Trash; it's no longer there. Didn't think to check for Flesh, or the others, for some reason.