The Legend of Lylah Clare

The culmination of Aldrich’s reckoning with Hollywood and the kickoff to a breathtaking series of uncompromising films, with which he immediately squandered the financial capital he’d earned from his global hit "The Dirty Dozen" in the name of artistic integrity. Kim Novak plays a dual role in her last major appearance: As starlet Elsa Brinkmann, she is hailed as the reincarnation of the legendary diva Lylah Clare, who died mysteriously twenty years earlier. Lylah’s former husband, an egomaniacal director (Peter Finch), is also fascinated by the resemblance and shoots a film with Elsa about Lylah’s life—with fatal consequences. Hollywood Babylon: Aldrich’s morbid, campy self-flagellation portrays the dream factory as a glittering wasteland that only the most vicious satire can do justice to. A hellish vision of commercial culture that is unheard of even by Aldrich’s standards of provocation. (C.H.)