Deprogram the Homelanders

SPLIT IMAGE (1982)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

 

If a suburban kid is an amazing athlete and is subjugated into the world of a religious cult, can he find his way back home or is he ushered into a new way of thinking about oneself? That is part of the story of 1982's forgotten "Split Image," an intriguing and thought-provoking film by director Ted Kotcheff that dares to ask if "normal American life" is corrupting our souls, our identity.

Michael O'Keefe is Danny Stetson, a college athlete whose goal is to be in the Olympics. He has two loving parents (Brian Dennehy and Elizabeth Ashley) who want only the best for him. One day, Danny runs into a beautiful girl named Rebecca (Karen Allen, who bears a sunshine smile that could melt any man's heart) who has a staring match with him. They talk. He is sarcastic with her and hopes for sex, and she only wants to get to know him. She is a delicate flower and he obviously is willing to go wherever she goes. After a brief scuffle involving a supposed kidnapping of a university student, Danny and Rebecca and friends head off for a weekend getaway to Homeland, a commune for young people. In all actuality, it is a religious cult commune, a place where everyone loves everybody. There is no violence, they all eat organic foods that they grow, they build their own houses and there is no real privacy either. If Danny tries to masturbate while she sleeps, he is stopped by someone who says, "Don't be a prostitute!" If he tries to urinate in a bathroom, he is followed by two women (eh, that may not be so bad). When Danny has a group meeting, he tries to understand why there is no discussion of "social problems."

Peter Fonda is Neil Kirklander, the leader of Homeland, who doesn't exploit the kids ("This is not a Communist country!") and wants everyone to be loved, to be free of the ills and greed of the world and to find meaning.  Kirklander proclaims that the parents of each young member is "dead" and changes the members' names in a fiery ceremony where all vestiges and personal items are burned to a crisp. Thus Danny's brief weekend stay with Rebecca is becoming permanent - he is suckered in and changes his name to "Joshua."

Most of "Split Image" is compelling and powerful but it is the transition of Danny into Joshua that has me split (no pun intended). Danny is an individual who may have found his true calling as an athlete, and who questions everything with deep sarcasm. It is hard to believe he would have stayed at Homeland longer than two seconds, let alone several months. The sermons by Kirklander are spiritual yet empty, and Danny knows it. The screenplay by Robert Kaufman and Robert Mark Kamen never quite establishes the "Jekyll and Hyde" transition where Danny turns into Joshua. In one scene, he attempts to escape Homeland and is almost killed when he jumps off a cliff into a river. Neil tells Danny he can go if he wishes, but he will go back to being lost. The irony may be that Danny is lost anyway.

"Split Image" doesn't show Homeland to be an evil place - that would be too easy. The truth is that such a place that encourages love to others is not a bad ideal to have - our own American society since this film's release in 1982 doesn't encourage us to love one another.  But the film never probes deeper questions into Kirklander himself, a man who is at peace and lives in his own house which he shares with no one. All members of Homeland share the same sleeping quarters. But who is Kirklander really, and why is a chain-smoking deprogrammer (the electric James Woods) needed to deprogram these kids in a place that is truly not threatening at all since all they do is promote "love." You can love yourself but save some love for others. The "self" matters less.

"Split Image" was financed by the now defunct Polygram Pictures and distributed by the bankrupt Orion Pictures. Clearly neither had much faith in the film since it was released in 129 screens and was quickly dispatched to home video and cable. It is a shame because, despite faults with the screenplay's depiction of two main characters, the film does ask tough questions about our place in a world where greed and capitalism take over any semblance of "love." Danny and Rebecca eventually find they are in love and lust with each other, two aspects of human relationships that are somehow outlawed in Homeland's cult. Even the deprogrammer can't truly bring Danny back from Joshua dreamland, and he knows it. Danny has been changed, he has been split. The most probing question the film asks is: if you escape from Homeland, what are you escaping to?