Adam Baran

A few weeks ago, BF and I went to see Jerry Schatzberg’s rare film Puzzle of a Downfall Child, which stars Faye Dunaway in one of her most intruiging and brilliant performances, along with the late Roy Scheider. It’s a strange, very seventies Waldo Salt-esque film about a model, Lou Andreas Sand, played by Dunaway who enters the world of modeling and quickly becomes on of the most famous and popular faces on the scene, only to quickly collapse into substance abuse, depression, and a nervous breakdown. There’s lots of cutting back and forth between the past, which shows her rise and fall, and the present, as Dunaway, secluded in isolation after a breakdown, is interviewed by her old friend (much in the same way Jerry Schatzberg interviewed his old friend Anne Saint-Marie - a long-ago famous model who the the film is based on). In fact, there’s so much cutting and Euro doom and gloom moodiness in the early part of the film that it could have been called Ingmar Bergman’s Next Top Model.

The film is said to have been Dunaway’s favorite film, and it’s easy to see why. Her performance is so sharp and mannered it’s impossible to forget. She embodies the character, more than that she is the character. Odd, confused, officious, haughty, needy, desperate, achingly beautiful, but also weary underneath. Her accent is insane, completely mannered, but totally unplaceable. And she’s a bit cuckoo, which is always fun to watch.

Of course the film is out of print, never on DVD or VHS, but of course, it’s on YouTube from a French DVD source, (sorry for the subtitles and quality). So here’s the first part of the film, and after the jump, if you’re so inclined and you’ve got time on your hands at work, like me, you can watch it at your leisure.