The Final Programme (1973) 1970s Psychedelic Cult Classic Still Holds Up (Review)

In the new featurette ‘A Feast of Fuest’, Kim Newman proposes that if Robert Fuest had a more successful career, he would’ve possibly become a serious rival to Ken Russell. This is a view that I harboured for most of the time I spent watching The Final Programme. I couldn’t help but be reminded of Russell’s The Devils with its similarly erratic visuals and abstract storytelling, so much so that I was beginning to wonder if Russell ghost-directed some of it. In particular, the mysterious opening scene is slathered with religious imagery. People in cultish robes standing around the funeral pyre of our main character’s not-long-deceased father. Then the credit ‘Designed, Written & Directed by Robert Fuest’ appears. The film maintains such a unique visual style that it becomes obvious that Fuest had so much control. It is obviously set in the near future, yet still trapped in a 1970s aesthetic.

The film follows the adventures of Jerry Cornelius (Jon Finch), a suave secret agent who looks like a glam rocker akin to Bryan Ferry or Steve Harley, whilst wearing a frilly shirt that I’m sure Jon Pertwee would have been massively proud of. Cornelius is more similar to a proto-Austin Powers than James Bond, albeit with a greater ability to plan a few steps ahead. He also has an addiction to chocolate digestives (one scene shows him opening his fridge to reveal multiple packets of them in the door, with a whole pile of loose biscuits elsewhere). It’s peculiar moments like this that make me view The Final Programme as somewhat of an anti-Bond film. It has the usual spy film plot of searching for missing microfilm (or as Tim Curry in National Lampoon’s Loaded Weapon 1 put it, “meekrofilm”). Yet it has a bizarrely self-aware tone, to the point where there are a few instances of actors looking straight into the camera lens, and the dialogue is so deadpan and witty that I thought that the characters were on the brink of breaking the fourth wall.

It even turns into an unexpected heist film at one point, adding The Italian Job to the list of other 60s/70s British films that The Final Programme reminded me of. As with how the latter film presents itself, it is still massively unique. Depicting a technologically developed society that has hints of a forthcoming post-apocalypse (the shot of a pile of scrapped cars right next to a classy-looking manor is certainly striking, even if the effect doesn’t look all that great), yet approaches the subject in an amusingly low-key manner. The author of the novel the film was based on, Michael Moorcock, was ultimately dissatisfied with the adaptation. An occasional lyricist for the space rock band Hawkwind, Moorcock was also intent on having them score the film before Fuest instead chose to use a jazzy score from synth pioneers Beaver & Krause, the jauntiness of which contrasts with the haunting visuals of the opening scene. It is this absurdity that I appreciated the most in The Final Programme. There are obvious similarities to Fuest’s The Abominable Dr Phibes from two years prior yet with him also being the designer, I would say this is a better representation of his work.

Despite the indecipherable nature of the plot, the deadpan and sarcastic dialogue gives it a self-aware tone, and most importantly of all it is very, very funny. The relationship between Cornelius and Jenny Runacre’s Miss Brunner is hysterical in how apathetic they are towards each other. Even though Moorcock wasn’t a fan of the adaptation, the story told in the film certainly interests me enough to want to read the Jerry Cornelius novels. It is only in recent years that The Final Programme has started to gain a wider cult following, and I am glad. Who knows, instead of another reboot of the Bond series we could get more Jerry Cornelius films sometime in the future. I would most definitely be interested.

Studio Canal’s release as part of the ‘Cult Classics’ line contains a gorgeous transfer that beautifully represents the whimsical and varied cinematography on display. Extras accompanying the feature include the aforementioned short documentary by Kim Newman, ‘A Feast of Fuest’ – where the film critic and horror author explains his affection for The Final Programme and Robert Fuest’s other works, from The Avengers to The Devil’s Rain), an interview with Jenny Runacre, an alternate version of the opening sequence taken from the film’s Italian release, and a selection of trailers from both the UK and US (where the film was re-edited and retitled as The Last Days of Man on Earth) cinema releases, with the US trailer largely spoiling the film’s ending.

Liam’s Archive: The Final Programme (1973)