A Zed & Two Noughts (1985)

Director:

Peter Greenaway

Writer:

Peter Greenaway (written by)

Release Date:

25 May 1990 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Plot:

Oliver Deuce, a successful doctor, is shattered when his wife is killed in a freak car accident involving...

Plot Keywords:

Grief | Decay | Animal | Leg | Twin

Cast

Andréa Ferréol	...	Alba Bewick
Brian Deacon	...	Oswald Deuce
Eric Deacon	...	Oliver Deuce
Frances Barber	...	Venus de Milo
Joss Ackland	...	Van Hoyten
Jim Davidson	...	Joshua Plate
Agnès Brulet	...	Beta Bewick
Guusje van Tilborgh	...	Caterina Bolnes
Gerard Thoolen	...	Van Meegeren
Ken Campbell	...	Stephen Pipe
Wolf Kahler	...	Felipe Arc-en-Ciel
Geoffrey Palmer	...	Fallast
David Attenborough	...	Documentary Narrator (voice)

Runtime:

115 min

Country:

UK | Netherlands

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Argentina:16 | Australia:M | Finland:K-12 | Sweden:11 | UK:15 | Spain:T | Germany:12

Filming Locations:

Rotterdam Zoo, Rotterdam, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands

Company:

British Film Institute (BFI)

Trivia:

Early in the movie, we are shown a front-page newspaper article about the deaths of the protagonists' wives. This front page also contains sidebar articles detailing events from two of director Peter Greenaway's subsequent films, The Belly of an Architect (1987) (the article headlined "Architect Dies") and Drowning by Numbers (1988) (the article headlined "A Hot Bath Heart Attack").

Quotes:

Oswald Deuce: How fast does a woman decompose?
Oliver Deuce: Six months, maybe a year? Depends on the conditions.
Oswald Deuce: Does being pregnant make any difference?
Oliver Deuce: No.
Oswald Deuce: And the baby?
Oliver Deuce: How far gone was she?
Oswald Deuce: Perhaps ten weeks.
Oliver Deuce: Then you'd never know.
Oswald Deuce: [long pause] I cannot stand the idea of her rotting away.
[short pause]
[...]

Movie Connections:

Featured in The Tulse Luper Suitcases, Part 1: The Moab Story (2003)

Soundtrack:

An Elephant Never Forgets

Obsession with symmetry

ZOO is a film based upon the symmetry involved in nature. Two brothers (born as Siamese twins now separated) both lose their wives in a car crash caused by a pregnant swan flying into their car. It turns out that both women were expecting. The two brothers both mourn the passing of their wives and unborn children and become increasing obsessed with life and death, particularly the transition between the two states. The Brothers happen to both work in a zoo as vets and use the zoos equipment in ever more bizarre experiments to observe the process of decay via time lapse photography (the results of which are shown frequently throughout the movie).

The film progresses via a series of well thought out scenes, the visual content of which are more important than either the action or the plot. Greenway continues to explore the necessity of symmetry in nature and also its artistic merit. This however, is a subterfuge for the real meaning of the film, which is the realization of man that he lives alone in a Godless and empty universe where life and both its beginning and ending seem purposeless.

A visual feast but a little pretentious.a bit like this message really.