Drowning by Numbers (1988)

User Rating:

6.8/10   

Director:

Peter Greenaway

Writer:

Peter Greenaway (written by)

Release Date:

June 1991 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Tagline:

The great death game.

Plot:

Tired of her husband's philanderous ways, the mother of two daughters drowns her husband. With the reluctant help of the local coroner...

Plot Keywords:

Coroner | Murder | Number | Counting | Game

Awards:

3 wins & 1 nomination

Cast

Joan Plowright	...	Cissie Colpitts 1
Juliet Stevenson	...	Cissie Colpitts 2
Joely Richardson	...	Cissie Colpitts 3
Bernard Hill	...	Madgett
Jason Edwards	...	Smut
Bryan Pringle	...	Jake
Trevor Cooper	...	Hardy
David Morrissey	...	Bellamy
John Rogan	...	Gregory
Paul Mooney	...	Teigan
Jane Gurnett	...	Nancy
Kenny Ireland	...	Jonah Bognor
Michael Percival	...	Moses Bognor
Joanna Dickens	...	Mrs. Hardy
Janine Duvitski	...	Marina Bellamy

Runtime:

118 min

Country:

UK | Netherlands

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

South Korea:18 | Argentina:16 | Australia:M | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | UK:18 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Suffolk, England, UK

Company:

Film Four International

Trivia:

The composition of the shot of Hardy's death mimics the painting by Andrea Mantegna called 'The Lamentation Over A Dead Christ (1480)'.

Quotes:

Smut: The object of this game is to dare to fall with a noose around your neck from a place sufficiently high enough off the ground, such that the fall will hang you. The object of the game is to punish those who have caused great unhappiness by their selfish actions. This is the best game of all, because the winner is also the loser, and the judge's decision is always final.

Movie Connections:

References The Falls (1980)

Soundtrack:

2nd Movement of Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola and Orchestra K354

Games

One woman in three bodies. Games about death, with death as a rule, and as a consequence. Life as this game and vice versa. The scoring of the game, the ruling of the script according to numbers. Sequential skipping through the numbers as a way of adumbrating the game to tell a story.

Another masterpiece from Greenaway, his most accessible in my view. But that makes it a lesser work compared to his others, because the story is perfectly comprehensible. One can see how his notion of structured visual allegory with narrative footnotes starts to emerge here. The latest I have seen at this writing is The Pillow Book where this is all so much more elaborate and integrated into the narrative. But this film still charms. I wish I could personally thank the financier.