This is probably not the best movie to start watching after a busy day at 10:30 P.M. Even though I had already heard the Who's original album, I was still completely unprepared for the sensory assault mounted by the film's director, Ken Russell. Every scene is a kaleidoscopic frenzy of garish and bizarre images, most filled with hilariously obvious symbolism (which the college kids watching the film with me seemed to enjoy pointing out), and reinforced by the Who's music, which runs throughout the movie at top volume and with barely any interruption. It's also badly dubbed to the actor's lip movements, which only adds to the overall strangeness. Russell seems particularly fond of having the actors degrade themselves- one long sequence shows Tommy being abused by his sadistic cousin and his perverted uncle. In another scene, involving Ann-Margret as his mother, champagne and baked beans erupt out of a TV and fill an immaculately white room. Following the lead of the original album, Russell seems to be trying to make some kind of satirical statement on organized religion, but the whole thing is so over-the-top and bears such little relationship to any reality that the attempts at commentary wind up as empty as the rest of the film. Russell's dubious accomplishment basically consists of having created the world's longest and noisiest music video.
