The Heart of Darkness
The Heart of Darkness
This chapter studies the bunker beneath the Edgecliff Establishment in Joseph Losey's The Damned (1963), which has properties reminiscent of other cinematic spaces that exert a strange influence beyond their boundaries. The Damned is a journey into the heart of darkness, all the darker for its location a stone's throw from the gaudy lights of a seaside resort. The hideout has to exist for the plot mechanics to operate, but it is as much a flaw in the script as the children's radioactivity. And it is this secret, irregular space that allows for the non-oblong, the ungoverned, and the fanciful. Like Freya's birdhouse, its rough-hewn surroundings provide a setting for expression and creation: here the children have 'invented' their parents using old magazine pictures, and tell stories about their situation. The hideout may be empowering for the children, but it has the opposite effect on the adults they bring to it.
Keywords: bunker, Edgecliff Establishment, Joseph Losey, The Damned, cinematic spaces
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