Baal

In this adaptation of Brecht's first play, directed by Alan Clarke for the BBC, David Bowie plays Baal, a brilliant but amoral and debauched poet who destroys everything around him. Set in the ten years leading up to the war, when the German empire was expanding, the play follows a series of episodes in the protagonist's life. Clarke films with rawness and disenchantment, mixing theater with television in dry, relentless shots. Bowie embodies chaos with rare intensity.