This is the most surreal experience you can ever have...by watching a square screen (or a rectangular one). Harold Pinter has written a work which takes the viewer on a nightmarish journey...yet all of the action takes place in a North London house...and also, inside your own head. There is underlying sexual tensions...underlying violence...underlying hatreds...and underlying psycho-sexual histories. The father Max is a sick mentally unstable ruler, who has no power. His son Lenny is a sick twisted pimp / thug. His other son Joey is a mentally challenged man who wants to become a boxer. His third son Teddy is visiting from the U.S.A. with his wife Ruth. Teddy is a Doctor of Philosophy...he is distant and he has almost no connection with his wife. Ruth is clearly mentally unhinged / unhappy and has no love at all for Teddy. Maxs brother Sam stays at the house. He is the one who is nearest to normality...but still light years away. Pinter has created six characters who are impossible to like, and impossible to relate to. The complex interactions which happen during the running time of 111 minutes...may transfix you, disturb you-- even make you question your faith in any form of humanity. It is an astonishingly powerful piece of work. It was first performed as a play in 1965. This film version was made in 1973. Since then academics have wrestled with the question...whats it all about?? My own view is that this is a real classic, and requires several views to get near what Pinter was telling us. Perhaps he was telling us...human relationships are always complex...and often the complexity is unfathomable.
Review of The Homecoming
