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When I saw this in its original run, at the Plaza Theatre in New York, as I recall, it had had a very mixed reaction, from both critics and audiences. I went to a showing during a weekday, which was not very well attended, and the usher who took my ticket also handed me a printed sheet with multiple explanations of various oblique elements in the story, detailing why scenes were presented the way they were. It was clearly an attempt by someone to make the film more understandable. I kept the sheet for some years, but it was finally discarded among multiple moves I've made since then.
I was never a fan of either Bowie or his music, and still think he makes a perfect alien from outer space. But I felt the film was more about style than substance. (I'd always been intrigued by Roeg as a director, and remembered his earlier cinematography credits, for the brilliant look in color of such films as THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH and FAHRENHEIT 451.) Like many cinematographers turned director, he never seemed to have the same skill at developing a story than he always had in presenting one, though I find all of his films continually interesting to watch. (There were rumors floating around at the time that the sex scenes in PERFORMANCE and DON'T LOOK NOW were real, and that Roeg would show the unexpurgated versions at private parties. Ah, the film business!)
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