films and tattoo koldo almandoz
Pieced skin with a sharp needle doused in ink. Light and time engraved on silver nitrate. Tattoos and Cinema. Cinema and Tattoos. Stigma
Every tattoo has a story to tell. Even if the owner doesn’t realise, that’s just the way of it. And it’s exactly what happens to Rod Steiger in the film "The Illustrated Man". The same story crops up in "Sherezade’s 1001 Nights": each and every tattoo that covers the protagonists body is an untold story. Each story becomes a new stigma in his life.
A tattooed face makes the Polynesian sailor Queequeg stand out from the others in the film "Moby Dick". It makes him that bit more different and interesting. The sailor who appears in Jean Vigo’s wonderful “L ´Atalante” is covered from head to toe in tattoos. Popeye has an angel tattooed on each arm. Nick Nolte, as a deserter in "Farewell to the King", owes his life to the sailboat tattooed on his chest. That same tattoo also makes him the chief and god to a tribe of Indians on an island off Borneo.
Tattoo bearers in western cinema have been prisoners. Steve McQueen had butterflies tattooed on his chest in "Papillon". You can bet that Henry Papillon had no intention of forgetting who he was in that Guinean prison-hell. In Scorsese’s "Cape Fear", Robert de Niro decorates his body with tattoos that scream out for vengeance, tattoos that seem set to shatter fragile Justice.
The camera settles on the racist tattoos on Sean Penn’s arms as he awaits the death penalty in "Dead Man Walkin’". The skinhead Edward Norton proudly shows off the swastika inked into his chest in "American History X".
There is, however, one film where the two different characters of the sailor and the prisoner come together and the tattoo, curiously enough, is shown in a positive light. The mutineers in "The Bounty" escape and find freedom on an island in the South Seas. The director Roger Donaldson only needs to use one image to show the step taken from being a prisoner to being a free man: the image of a tattoo. The moment the natives on the island in "The Bounty" tattoo the mutineers their past lives cease to exist and they begin new ones.
This is because the tattoo, as well as being a stigma, is also the mark of identity and personality.
Wearing your personality on your arm
Scorsese’s version can be clearly seen in Robert Mitchum and the role he played in "Cape Fear" in 1962. The reason why I bring Mitchum up is because, in my opinion, he’s the man who has born what I consider to be the most meaningful tattoos in the history of cinema. The two tattoos he shows off in "The Night of the Hunter" are enough to make anybody’s blood run cold. Frightening is the only word you can use to describe the priest with love tattooed across the knuckles on one hand and hate across the knuckles on the other.
"Memento" is another film that shows just how much tattoos can mark a person’s personality. A person who suffers from amnesia tattoos the things they don’t want to forget on different parts of their body. The tattoo, as well as being a stigma and personality, is also memory.
Once were warriors, from New Zealand, tells the story of a people fighting against the loss of their identity, peculiar traits and dignity. The defence of their tattered identity is poignantly highlighted by their use of their Maori ancestors’ tribal tattoos. Harvey Keitel follows the example of the sailors on The Bounty and creates a new opportunity for himself by using Maori tattoos in "The Piano". There are others who also deny past lives by removing tattoos.
Russell Crowe in "Gladiator" is an example of this. He burns off the tattoo that states he is a member of the Roman army. Another character in "Harold and Maude" hides the tattoo that shows they suffered at the hands of Nazis in a concentration camp.
Irezumi
Eastern cinema has used tattoos in much the same way as they have been used in the making of films in the west. They are used to stigmatise the character. The Japanese masters, it must be said, have been a bit more poetic when reflecting Irezumi-an art and culture. Kenji Mizoguchi tells us the story of a painter who uses his art to decorate a prostitutes back in Utamaru. The tattoo also plays a starring role in both Irezumi and Yakuzu. We get to see Robert Mitchum surrounded by tattoos again in the Hollywood remake of Yakuzu. In Kikujiro we see the tattooed back of Takeshi Kitano as he slips into the swimming pool. That’s when we get to see the past that he has hidden from us throughout the film.
We can clearly see the influence of Utamaro in The Pillow Book. Peter Greenway treats us to a rather poetical story of a woman who seeks to revive the memory of her father in the tattooed bodies of other men. The big screen version of the comic Crying Freeman is a different kettle of fish altogether. An evil sect tattoo the main character’s body from top to bottom in order to gain some sort of malevolent control over him.
(s)ta(r)ttooing out
He nacido para revolucionar el infierno (I was born to revolutionise Hell). This phrase is emblazoned across the back of a stranger lying on the beach in Barcelona. This is the starting point for Detective Carvallo’s investigations in Bigas Luna’s “opera prima” Tatuaje. The tattoo of a symbol etched into the back of a little girl is also central to Kevin Costner’s Waterworld. Ana Magnami and her truckdriver lover Burt Lancaster each have a tattoo of a rose in the film The Rose Tattoo. Thorny it may be, but it’s still love at the end of the day.
Tattoos are pigmented memories of past loves and hates scratched into our skin. Cinema is a train of light and shade that serves as memory to us in the same way. The connection between tattoos and cinema is more than only the poetic link just mentioned. There are plenty of examples of what we’re on about here in life away from the big screen. You just have to take a look at the tattoo born by Sean Connery, the man who played the Queen’s loyal servant 007. It reads: “Scotland Forever”.
Every tattoo has a story to tell. Even if the owner doesn’t realise, that’s just the way of it. And it’s exactly what happens to Rod Steiger in the film "The Illustrated Man". The same story crops up in "Sherezade’s 1001 Nights": each and every tattoo that covers the protagonists body is an untold story. Each story becomes a new stigma in his life.
A tattooed face makes the Polynesian sailor Queequeg stand out from the others in the film "Moby Dick". It makes him that bit more different and interesting. The sailor who appears in Jean Vigo’s wonderful “L ´Atalante” is covered from head to toe in tattoos. Popeye has an angel tattooed on each arm. Nick Nolte, as a deserter in "Farewell to the King", owes his life to the sailboat tattooed on his chest. That same tattoo also makes him the chief and god to a tribe of Indians on an island off Borneo.
Tattoo bearers in western cinema have been prisoners. Steve McQueen had butterflies tattooed on his chest in "Papillon". You can bet that Henry Papillon had no intention of forgetting who he was in that Guinean prison-hell. In Scorsese’s "Cape Fear", Robert de Niro decorates his body with tattoos that scream out for vengeance, tattoos that seem set to shatter fragile Justice.
The camera settles on the racist tattoos on Sean Penn’s arms as he awaits the death penalty in "Dead Man Walkin’". The skinhead Edward Norton proudly shows off the swastika inked into his chest in "American History X".
There is, however, one film where the two different characters of the sailor and the prisoner come together and the tattoo, curiously enough, is shown in a positive light. The mutineers in "The Bounty" escape and find freedom on an island in the South Seas. The director Roger Donaldson only needs to use one image to show the step taken from being a prisoner to being a free man: the image of a tattoo. The moment the natives on the island in "The Bounty" tattoo the mutineers their past lives cease to exist and they begin new ones.
This is because the tattoo, as well as being a stigma, is also the mark of identity and personality.
Wearing your personality on your arm
Scorsese’s version can be clearly seen in Robert Mitchum and the role he played in "Cape Fear" in 1962. The reason why I bring Mitchum up is because, in my opinion, he’s the man who has born what I consider to be the most meaningful tattoos in the history of cinema. The two tattoos he shows off in "The Night of the Hunter" are enough to make anybody’s blood run cold. Frightening is the only word you can use to describe the priest with love tattooed across the knuckles on one hand and hate across the knuckles on the other.
"Memento" is another film that shows just how much tattoos can mark a person’s personality. A person who suffers from amnesia tattoos the things they don’t want to forget on different parts of their body. The tattoo, as well as being a stigma and personality, is also memory.
Once were warriors, from New Zealand, tells the story of a people fighting against the loss of their identity, peculiar traits and dignity. The defence of their tattered identity is poignantly highlighted by their use of their Maori ancestors’ tribal tattoos. Harvey Keitel follows the example of the sailors on The Bounty and creates a new opportunity for himself by using Maori tattoos in "The Piano". There are others who also deny past lives by removing tattoos.
Russell Crowe in "Gladiator" is an example of this. He burns off the tattoo that states he is a member of the Roman army. Another character in "Harold and Maude" hides the tattoo that shows they suffered at the hands of Nazis in a concentration camp.
Irezumi
Eastern cinema has used tattoos in much the same way as they have been used in the making of films in the west. They are used to stigmatise the character. The Japanese masters, it must be said, have been a bit more poetic when reflecting Irezumi-an art and culture. Kenji Mizoguchi tells us the story of a painter who uses his art to decorate a prostitutes back in Utamaru. The tattoo also plays a starring role in both Irezumi and Yakuzu. We get to see Robert Mitchum surrounded by tattoos again in the Hollywood remake of Yakuzu. In Kikujiro we see the tattooed back of Takeshi Kitano as he slips into the swimming pool. That’s when we get to see the past that he has hidden from us throughout the film.
We can clearly see the influence of Utamaro in The Pillow Book. Peter Greenway treats us to a rather poetical story of a woman who seeks to revive the memory of her father in the tattooed bodies of other men. The big screen version of the comic Crying Freeman is a different kettle of fish altogether. An evil sect tattoo the main character’s body from top to bottom in order to gain some sort of malevolent control over him.
(s)ta(r)ttooing out
He nacido para revolucionar el infierno (I was born to revolutionise Hell). This phrase is emblazoned across the back of a stranger lying on the beach in Barcelona. This is the starting point for Detective Carvallo’s investigations in Bigas Luna’s “opera prima” Tatuaje. The tattoo of a symbol etched into the back of a little girl is also central to Kevin Costner’s Waterworld. Ana Magnami and her truckdriver lover Burt Lancaster each have a tattoo of a rose in the film The Rose Tattoo. Thorny it may be, but it’s still love at the end of the day.
Tattoos are pigmented memories of past loves and hates scratched into our skin. Cinema is a train of light and shade that serves as memory to us in the same way. The connection between tattoos and cinema is more than only the poetic link just mentioned. There are plenty of examples of what we’re on about here in life away from the big screen. You just have to take a look at the tattoo born by Sean Connery, the man who played the Queen’s loyal servant 007. It reads: “Scotland Forever”.
