Alexandro Jodorowsky:

Alejandro Jodorowsky or Alexandro Jodorowsky (pronounced "Aleh-HAN-dro Yoh-doh-ROV-ski") (born February 7, 1929, in Iquique, Chile) is an actor, director, producer, composer, mime, comic book writer and psychotherapist born to Ashkenazi Jewish parents of Russian origin. He is particularly known for having directed a handful of esoteric, surreal and shocking films, and for having written several comic books.

The revered cult filmmaker once stated, "I ask of cinema what most North Americans ask of psychedelic drugs." He is also a New Age spiritualist, and one of the world's leading researchers of the Tarot. Jodorowsky has lately committed a lot of attention to developing a psychological therapy called "Psychomagic" which aims to heal the psychological wounds suffered in the early stages of life. This therapy is based on the belief that the performance of certain outside acts can directly act upon the unconscious mind, releasing it from a series of traumas, some of which are passed down from generation to generation. These acts are prescribed by the therapist after having studied the patient's personality and family tree.

On December 3, 2005, he officiated at the non-denominational marriage ceremony of friend Marilyn Manson and Dita Von Teese (real name: Heather Sweet) at Castle Gurteen in Kilsheelan, County Tipperary, Ireland. Manson has stated that Jodorowsky influenced his entire visual style.

His first feature length film, Fando y Lis, is available on DVD in the US and is infamous for inciting a full scale riot at its premiere in the Acapulco Film Festival. There is a small scale circulation of his works on the internet.

His second film La Montaña Sagrada (1973) was entirely financed by John Lennon and Yoko Ono after they arranged distribution for El Topo. At a projected budget of $1,500,000 (in USA dollars), it was to have been the most expensive Mexican film production to date. The film reportedly cost only half that amount

Jodorowsky began working in 1975 on an adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune. The project was intended to involve his son Brontis (Paul), Orson Welles as the Baron, Salvador Dalí as the Emperor, Mick Jagger as Feyd Rautha, Alain Delon as Duncan Idaho, Geraldine Chaplin as Lady Jessica, Dan O'Bannon for the script, Chris Foss, Pink Floyd, H.R. Giger and Jean Giraud (Mœbius). Ultimately, its funding evaporated, but Jodorowsky claimed it was sabotaged by the major studios in Hollywood because it was too French (a strange claim considering that Jodorowsky, while a naturalized citizen of France, has never identified with any particular country or culture. Although the funding and his producer were French: Jerome Seydoux). Many close to the project claim that the set designs later turned up in Star Wars. Several of the people working on Jodorowsky's version of Dune later worked on Alien with elements similar to that of the failed movie. Of course, in the early 1980s, David Lynch would later make his own version of Dune.

In 1989, Jodorowsky completed another important film Santa Sangre, which received some theatrical distribution and mixed critical reviews that nonetheless, put Jodorowsky back on the cultural map. It delved into psychodrama territory with its protagonist becoming the amputated arms and hands of his mother and committing a string of murders in the process. Several of Jodorowsky's sons were recruited as actors.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, Jodorowsky attempted to make a sequel to El Topo called at different times The Sons of El Topo and Abelcain, but he could not find investors for the project.

Jodorowsky once said, "Most directors make films with their eyes. I make films with my testicles." He made almost all his movies in Mexico.

In 2000, Jodorowsky won the Jack Smith Lifetime Achievement Award from the Chicago Underground Film Festival. He attended the Festival and his films were shown, including the then-grey legal status "El Topo" and "The Holy Mountain". According to festival director Bryan Wendorf, it was an open question of whether CUFF would be allowed to show these films (ie. whether the police would show up and shut the Festival down).

Selective Filmography:

Fando y Lis (1967)
El Topo (1970)
The Holy Mountain (La montaña sagrada, 1973)
Tusk (1980)
Santa Sangre (1989)

(Source : wikipedia)

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