Gábor Bódy’s Use of Media Archaeology and Intermediality as a Forerunner of Peter Greenaway’s Postmodern Cinema

Past centuries’ optical apparatuses for the documentation and quantification of land and the human body are central motifs of the first two feature films of Gábor Bódy and Peter Greenaway. Both directors explored various methods of incorporating the culture and optical technology of the era depicted in the narrative into the language of film. The ties between American Torso (Amerikai Anzix, Gábor Bódy, 1975) and The Draughtman’s Contract (Peter Greenaway, 1982) lie in their focus on the use of optical appliances. Their second feature films, Narcissus and Psyche (Nárcisz és Psyché, Gábor Bódy, 1980) and A Zed and Two Noughts (Peter Greenaway, 1985), both draw strongly from the chronophotography of the 19th-century photographer, Eadweard Muybridge. However, the ways in which the homages are woven into the narrative differ significantly: in Bódy’s film, the reference appears as part of a dreamlike montage, while in Greenaway’s, it is integrated diegetically into the plot. Ultimately, the synchronicity between the directors came to an end. Bódy died in 1985, while Greenaway continued making films before later expanding his practice into the field of video art.