The theme seems to focus on the bestial in man's nature, but the message is perhaps prescient--how civilizations historically move from savage to sophisticated and then fall into decadence, regressing to the cruder culture. The first American feature film by director James Ivory and producer Ismail Merchant, Savages concerns such a tribe of aborigines living in Stone Age conditions who discover an abandoned mansion in the forest. Soon after they've been civilized by the house, they begin to revert, their primitive personalities re-emerge and, inevitably, they return to the woods. Though the cast includes a group of established actors and actresses--Ultra Violet, Kathleen Widdoes, Paulita Sedgwick, Asha Puthli, Salome Jens, Margaret Brewster, Anne Francine, Neil Fitzgerald, Lewis J. Stadlen, Christopher Pennock, Russ Thacker and the fresh film face of model Susie Blakely--director Ivory contends that there is no one star. "All the characters have their moments; some may have a few more lines or scenes than others, but if there is a star as such, it's the house," he says. "It exerts a tremendous influence over all the characters, just as it did over me. The inspiration for the film actually came from the house. Last year I was up on the Hudson near Scarborough, looking at old houses for another film, and I was extremely impressed by this particular one. Time passed and I began speculating on how I could make use of it in a film. Finally I realized it could serve as the central civilizing element in Savages." Before this film, which Ivory considers an "allegory on the rise and fall of any civilization," the Merchant-Ivory team had worked primarily in India, turning out such critically acclaimed movies as The Householder, about a young man's coming of age in contemporary Indian society; Shakespeare Wallah, which tolled the death knell of English colonialism in India; The Guru and Bombay Talkie, both comments on the clichés with which the West views the East and vice versa. "Although I've developed a strong fondness for India and her people," says Ivory, "I was glad to return to America to shoot Savages, and I hope to do more work here soon." If his future American film efforts anywhere nearly match Savages (scheduled for release by DIA Films in early June), we predict moviegoers and critics alike will be even more pleased that Ivory and company have come home.
