Hidden Depths

Most modern thrillers start with a bang, but that’s certainly not the case with Michael Haneke’s “Caché”, a coolly elegant, challenging French mystery movie released in 2005. No way, José. Instead, this insidious film opens with a lingering, static shot of a nondescript, gated townhouse in a bourgeois Parisian neighbourhood. We watch in silence as a woman leaves through the front door. We observe nameless pedestrians strolling by. We note the parked cars in the side street, for in truth nothing much happens for a few minutes. Eventually we hear a couple talking to each other, though we do not see them. Finally, the image abruptly blurs, and then begins to fast forward and we realise that we’ve been watching a videotape, along with the couple that owns the house. It’s been sent to them anonymously and they are as much in the dark as we are. In this way, “Caché” grabs our attention from the very first frame (literally).

Georges Laurent (Daniel Auteuil), the successful host of a literary talk show on television, lives in a comfortable house with his wife Anne (Juliette Binoche), a book publisher, and their teenage son Pierrot. They appear to be the perfect (happy) family, but cracks appear when Georges starts to receive surveillance tapes of his family and alarmingly gruesome drawings from a stalker who seems to know a great deal about their lives. As the tapes contain no direct threats, the police refuse to help, leaving Georges to follow a clue in one of them, which leads him to the modest apartment of an Algerian man named Majid (Maurice Bénichou), whose parents worked for Georges’ family when he was a young boy. This meeting raises questions about Georges’ childhood, which he does not want to discuss, not even with his wife.

"Welcome to the house of fun"

In fact, nothing is ever as it seems in this film, which was aptly translated as “Hidden” for the English-speaking market with a double meaning – hidden camera (camera obscura, if you will) and hidden guilt. From that very first scene, the viewer can never be sure of what he is watching: is it the film’s (semi-reliable) narrative or another tape recorded by the unknown voyeur? Before long, we feel as off-balance and confused as Georges and Anne. As their trust in each other crumbles, we also realise that the director’s perspective is untrustworthy, resulting in an ever increasing sense of dread and paranoia. The same, indistinguishable long distance view is used on numerous occasions, but only as the scene develops does it become clear whether the shot is “live or Memorex”. Haneke is subtly, but effectively warning us that we should be suspicious of any expectations we may have or indeed any “reality” that we are shown – it’s what’s under the surface that really counts.

The movie is all the more powerful for the secrets that it keeps and most of its inner tensions are left unresolved apart from one brief and shockingly visceral moment. As it happens, the director is not the only one holding out on people, as Georges informs Anne that he might know who is behind the terrifying campaign, but refuses to say any more. It becomes increasingly likely that it pertains to some unspoken and long suppressed event, but Georges keeps the truth hidden in the same way that Haneke conceals the movie’s point of view, its political references and even the identity of the perpetrator.

"Video killed the radio star"

It’s a masterclass in how to unnerve your audience, not through what you show, but what is hidden from view. The tapes sent to George contain nothing threatening, but their menace arises not from their content, but the fact that they are being filmed. In traditional European fashion, not much seems to take place, but this slow burning study in buried guilt and sub-conscious prejudice steadily ratchets up the tension and develops an atmosphere of approaching danger. The film might not scare you out of your skin, but it will most certainly get under your skin. While Haneke clearly wants to deliver a political message, he never allows himself to be distracted from the business of building suspense, resulting in a taut, unsettling psychological thriller of the utmost originality. He manages to imbue the most ordinary of moments with a feeling of vague dread, making use of disquieting devices and sinister hesitations, as he repeatedly subverts the audience’s expectations.

As with many previous Haneke films, such as “Funny Games” and “Time of the Wolf”, there is a sense that something dire could occur at any time. Another common premise in his movies is the comfortable life of a complacent, middle-class family being threatened by an outside force. In this case, the simple fact that someone is watching them is enough to shatter their smug world. Their contented existence would have continued in its merry way, except for the disturbing fact that it was being observed by persons unknown. Although Socrates believed that “the unexamined life is not worth living”, the other side of the coin is disquieting in its own way.

"Can you guess what it is yet?"

Consequently, the mystery of who sent the tapes is of almost secondary importance, as the impact on the Laurent family becomes the most significant issue. Previously unimagined weaknesses in the fabric of Georges and Anne’s marriage emerge, as their well-dressed façade begins to fracture under the pressure of untold secrets. There is no real love or sentiment with this couple, just the cosy chemistry of a shared existence. The fragility of their ideal relationship is revealed and matters are made worse when Pierrot’s simmering discontent causes him to accuse his mother of having an affair.

When the intimidating tapes start to arrive, Georges initially seems almost paralysed by the need to carry on as if nothing had disturbed his glamorous media life. The deflating of his self-importance seems almost as painful to him as the notion that his family is under attack. Aficionados of French cinema have long appreciated Daniel Auteuil as a great actor and he delivers a magnificently compelling performance here as a man who cannot acknowledge his past – not because he thinks that it didn’t happen, but because he does not appreciate its significance.

"It wasn't me"

It’s an ambiguous, and in many ways unsympathetic, role, as Georges simply refuses to accept any responsibility or express any regret for his previous actions, which is hardly surprising, as he does not even connect emotionally with the present. He is an arrogant, self-justifying man, who has repressed his youthful cruelty for a long time. His anger lies just beneath the surface, so when he feels under pressure, he reacts with (racist) aggression, repeating the behaviour that started the cycle and adding insult to injury.

As his more balanced wife, Juliette Binoche is equally superb with her subtle, but utterly convincing portrayal of a woman who comes to realise that she no longer understands a husband who cannot be honest with her. Anne is one of those beautiful women who make everything seem effortless, balancing a flourishing career with an enviable private life, where she is a loving wife, a dutiful mother and a gracious hostess. It’s a sensitive display of bemusement and betrayed trust, and Anne is shocked to witness Georges’ emerging secrets and violent reaction.

"Juliette Bravo"

Haneke’s characters are never easy to like, yet it’s impossible not to empathise with the Laurents’ predicament and their growing anxiety. Initially, we cannot help but relate to this seemingly decent couple, as their perfect lives come under threat, but gradually we begin to question the basis of their conceited, self-righteous existence, as it appears that Georges’ casual cruelty as a child has returned to haunt him.

Ultimately, “Caché” is a story about guilt and how this is denied – on both a personal and collective level. The events not only re-open old wounds that Georges had long since repressed, reminding him of the harm he inflicted on his Algerian “brother”, but also highlight the issue of the French nation’s collective responsibility for the mistreatment of Algerian immigrants. As Haneke said, “this movie is a tale of morality dealing with how one lives with guilt”. In the case of Georges, the answer is to deny any responsibility, so when he meets Majid’s son, he says, “You’ll never give me a bad conscience. I’m not to blame”.

"It's such a perfect day"

While the film is almost claustrophobically personal, it is fascinatingly broad in scope, as it addresses the universal theme of the West’s responsibility for the damage done while colonising Third World countries. On the face of it, Georges is an educated, enlightened liberal, but his response to the tapes is to accuse the foreigner in his midst, thus exposing the latent fear and hatred of the Muslims that lies not very far below his urbane exterior. This is an obvious metaphor for France’s inability to accept accountability for the way it has handled its indigenous Algerian population. We hear that Majid’s parents never came back from a march in Paris, which is a reference to a shameful night in October 1961 (“la nuit noire”), when the police massacred up to two hundred Algerians during a peaceful demonstration.

The film’s social statement is unmistakable, but it is so skillfully woven into the fabric of the story that it never feels like a lecture. Indeed, the subject matter proved eerily prescient, when the movie’s release preceded the riots in the Parisian banlieues by only a few weeks, once again demonstrating the problems caused by the divide between those who enjoy the fruits of a capitalist society and those who are consigned to its fringes. There are parallels with other recent conflicts, such as the ongoing struggles in Iraq, which is actually shown on the enormous TV screen in the background of the Laurent’s living room. Needless to say, the unworried couple remains oblivious to the deaths announced by the latest news bulletin, only reinforcing the blithe indifference felt towards those less fortunate than them/us.

"Is it because I is black?"

Yes, I do mean “them and us”, for one of Haneke’s great strengths is the way that he uses the camera to engage the audience, so that it is impossible to remain a passive participant. At first, he makes the viewer complicit in the voyeuristic pleasure in watching Georges disintegrate on receipt of the creepy tapes, turning us all into accomplices for the crimes being played out on screen, as his destructive gaze invites us to partake in the remorseless campaign of terror. Then, by creating sufficient suspicion of Majid in Georges’ mind, the film forces us to confront our own attitude to immigrants in the post-colonial world. In the same way as the camera, we edit our memories in order to spare our conscience.

With its sparse, economical manner, the film confronts viewers head-on with some issues that are profoundly uncomfortable. Haneke is just as uncompromising in the way that he does not mollycoddle his audience. He glories in ambiguity, leaving the audience to think for itself, pretty much letting people draw their own conclusions. He explained this approach thus:

I like the multiplicity of books, because each book is different in the mind of each reader. It's the same with this film - if three hundred people are in a cinema watching it, they will all see a different film, so in a way there are thousands of different versions of “Hidden”. The point being that, despite what TV shows us, and what the news stories tell us, there is never just one truth, there is only personal truth.

"He's behind you"

Frequently described as the “conscience” of European cinema, Michael Haneke is a provocative film-maker with a justified reputation for stark, sometimes brutal, films that will make heavy demands of their audience. His trademarks include tremendously long static shots, no dramatic musical scores and brief outbursts of extreme violence. “Caché” is possibly his most watchable work, and though it is still an austere piece, it manages to explore serious themes of guilt and complacency without stinting on the suspense - demanding yet accessible. Critics have long acclaimed Haneke with the Cannes Film Festival giving him the Best Director prize in 2005 for “Caché” and this year rewarding his latest film “The White Ribbon” with the coveted Palme d’Or.

With its voyeuristic theme, “Caché” inevitably recalls Hitchcock’s “Rear Window”, albeit the perpetrator’s intentions are much less benign than good old James Stewart and Haneke has a far more political agenda than “the master of suspense”. A better comparison may be David Cronenberg’s powerful “A History of Violence”, which is also about a man with a secret history hidden from his family, whose capacity for violence emerges when under attack. Like “Caché”, the fate of the “violent” hero is similarly uncertain when the film ends, though at least we are reasonably sure of the identity of the “bad guy”.

"My life's not an open book"

Haneke, on the other hand, does not play by the traditional rules of the thriller and never explicitly identifies who has been sending the tapes. He very cleverly uses the audience’s greed for a neat answer to encourage any preconceptions we may have. The desire to know “whodunit” leads us down many false roads, making us Georges’ partners in crime when he flings out false accusations. This absence of closure may frustrate some, but is an essential element in the film’s success. Haneke is unapologetic about not dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s:

I'm not going to give anyone the answer. If you think it's Majid, Pierrot, Georges, the malevolent director, God himself, the human conscience - all these answers are correct. But if you come out wanting to know who sent the tapes, you didn't understand the film. To ask this question is to avoid asking the real question the film raises, which is more: how do we treat our conscience and our guilt and reconcile ourselves to living with our actions? I look at it as productive frustration. Films that are entertainments give simple answers, but I think that's ultimately more cynical, as it denies the viewer room to think. If there are more answers at the end, then surely it is a richer experience.

It is therefore logical that the closing scene, a long shot of multi-cultural pupils conversing on school steps, is defiantly ambiguous, but it feels like a natural conclusion to a film that aims to prove that there are no easy answers. If you watch closely, you will observe two children casually talking in the background, giving a tantalizing hint of something truly horrible. But is this really the solution? Is it the end of the family’s torment? Or the birth of another revenge plot? Maybe Haneke is once again toying with our perceptions by alluding to a vision of modern France at peace with itself, when it could be yet another videotape. Whatever the answer, the ending has the desired effect of leaving the viewer feeling as paranoid and distrustful as the characters, underlining the need to think more deeply about who the real victims are in this tale.

"Silent night"

Like the best French films, “Caché” is open to numerous interpretations. It is a movie of rare, penetrating intelligence that will leave you considering the many issues that it raises long after the closing credits have rolled. Haneke has produced a wonderfully edgy thriller, while addressing important themes like guilt, racism, recent French history and even the art of cinema, so it would be churlish to also expect him to present us with the “answer to life, the universe and everything else”. As he said, “It's the duty of art to ask questions, not to provide answers. And if you want a clearer answer, I'll have to pass”.

The Fischer King

When you think that your situation can get no worse, when you are truly at your lowest ebb, when you have reached the most depressed point of your life, then you would probably describe your position as “under a frog’s arse down a coalmine”. No? Well, you would if you were Hungarian and this evocative expression is the basis of Tibor Fischer’s first novel “Under the Frog”, which describes Hungary’s desperate existence beneath uncompromising Soviet rule.

It is uncomfortable, to say the very least, to be “under the frog”, but this is where the poor Hungarians found themselves in 1944 when the Second World War drew to a close and the German invaders were replaced by their Soviet “liberators”, who installed a puppet government. The twelve years from their arrival to the heroic, but ill-fated, 1956 uprising provide the tragic backdrop for Fischer’s book.

"Things can only get better"

Tibor Fischer has a Hungarian family background and has worked in Budapest, but considers himself to be thoroughly British. In 1993 the influential literary magazine Granta selected him as one of the 20 best young British writers (along with such disparate talents as Kazuo Ishiguro and Philip Kerr), though that did not stop his main character in “Under the Frog” attributing the appeal of the English language to the fact that “it was only spoken by rotten imperialists.”

Fischer’s work is invariably a thrilling combination of the entertaining and thought provoking, full of laugh-out-loud humour and quirky, biting intelligence. Subsequent novels include “The Thought Gang” with its band of philosophical bank robbers; “The Collector Collector” with its premise of a bowl (yes, that’s right, clay with something to say) narrating vast tracts of unrecorded history; “Voyage to the End of the Room” with its take on modern travel (without leaving your room); and “Good to be God” with its tales of the Church of the Heavily Armed Christ in sunny Miami.

"The Hungary Years"

However, “Under the Frog” is generally acknowledged to be Fischer’s masterpiece. Apparently rejected by an astonishing 58 publishers, the book went on to be shortlisted for the 1993 Booker Prize. It’s a fantastic debut, written with all the energy, love of life and dazzling language of the best first novels. He takes a serious subject, life in Communist Hungary, and is seriously funny about it. The brutal suppression of the 1956 Hungarian revolution has never been told in a more humorous vein.

The bleakness of post-war Hungary under its Stalinist leaders is obviously a fairly grim subject, but Fischer’s strength is turning what should be a hopeless state of affairs into a series of blackly comic misadventures. There are all kinds of books written about misery and oppression, but there are very few that are as hilarious as this one. This does not mean that the hardships are in any way cheapened by the jokes, rather they are highlighted by the all too plausible human responses to them, such as when a History teacher does not accept the Soviet invasion as an adequate excuse for completing a homework assignment: “You were hiding in that cellar for ten weeks. You must have had plenty of time.”

"I never play basketball now"

Although some of the anecdotes are hysterically funny, the book still manages to accurately convey the sense of repression and deprivation that gave rise to the revolt. In fact, the comic passages sparkle all the more, because the reality behind them is so sombre. The vicious incompetence of the regime is all the more effectively exposed, as it is described in such a jocular manner. Written with a sure touch and chock-full of delightfully ironic wit, the tale nevertheless has many heartbreaking moments of sadness and regret.

However, the book does not get bogged down with the dry, depressing history, but instead focuses on what it is like to be young in such a society and how the protagonists avoid being ground down by the authorities. It follows the fortunes of two young men whose interests are the same as those the world over, namely looking for sex, while avoiding work and responsibility. The only difference in post-war Hungary is that they are also searching for more prosaic needs such as food and shelter, while striving to avoid military service. They indulge in many silly pranks, but it’s clear that these distractions are an attempt to create a semblance of normality and a way of keeping their sanity despite the chaos and horror surrounding them.

"Hungary like the wolf"

Gyuri and his friend Pataki are notionally employed by the Hungarian State Railway in order to preserve their amateur status, but are really basketball players for the railway team. Actually, they really spend their time touring the country drinking, gambling, chasing girls and generally fooling around (for some reason they travel to all their basketball matches in the nude, even when this involves using public transport). Like an East European Del Boy, Gyuri is skiving, ducking and diving, but most importantly of all, he is surviving.

Their basketball team is well established in the First Division, but is never going to be a credible challenger for the championship while the league contains teams from the army and the secret police, as the former can draft any player it wants, while the latter can arrest opponents. No matter, for basketball “was better than a real job where you were expected to work for the money they didn’t give you”, such as digging ditches in the army.

"Mr and Mrs"

The boys’ everyday preoccupation may be having fun, but they intermittently dream of escaping to the West. Gyuri’s bad “moral credentials” prevent him progressing in his career, but his desire to leave is not motivated by material ambitions, rather a yearning for freedom away from the heavy hand of Communism. He would be content to be:

A street sweeper in London. Or New York. Or Cleveland; he wasn't that fussy. Anywhere outside. Any job. No matter how menial, a window cleaner, a dustman, a labourer: you could just do it, just carry out your job and you wouldn't need an examination in Marxism-Leninism, you wouldn't need to look at pictures of Rákosi or whoever had super-briganded their way to the top lately.

Pataki seems to adapt more successfully to life under Communism. The effortless star of the basketball team, he is a quick-witted trickster, both on and off the court, constantly questioning authority, though his rebelliousness seems to be driven more by his restless personality than any deep-seated ideology. His approach to life is in marked contrast to his poor father, who must first endure interrogation and torture before being released to suffer another form of humiliation, having been judged “too dull” to be a conspirator.

Gyuri is only marginally more serious-minded than Pataki, though he is an opportunist of a different stripe: too cynical to be an idealist, too moral to blow with the prevailing winds. He opts to not co-operate with the dictatorship, but acts primarily out of self-interest, observing his country with a cynical detachment, though he is a perennial under-achiever. Actually, his very ordinariness is a real plus for the story, as it makes him so believable. As opposed to a heroic or tragically downtrodden figure, Gyuri is just like you and me, which makes us sympathise with his thoughts and understand his growing bewilderment and wish to join the rebels. Indeed, his character develops in line with the building optimism and rising self-belief of the whole country.

"Is it Grant or Phil Mitchell?"

It is questionable whether Gyuri would develop a social conscience, if he does not meet and fall in love with Jadwiga, a resolutely anti-Communist student from Poland. Although the romance never comes to full fruition, Gyuri at least manages to “grow a pair”. The relationship is vibrant and extremely expressive, but is made even more affecting against the background of the initial ripples of unrest and the impending revolution. Indeed, possibly the two most moving moments in the story involve Jadwiga: first, when the couple face the Russian tanks in Budapest; then, in the final scene, when Gyuri looks back from the Austrian border.

The book wastes no opportunity to put the boot into the Communist system, its brutality, corruption and plain silliness. In revenge for having to see the colossal bronze statue of Stalin “sodomising the Budapest skyline”, Gyuri uses selected speeches of the party secretary to wipe his arse:

He was trying to enjoy his sojourn at the hindquarters' headquarters with extracts from these books, but although the idea had been highly pleasing, the reality wasn't as satisfactory. The Communists couldn't even hack it as toilet paper.

"You and your Spanish eyes will wait for me"

The Catholic church does not get away scot-free, being described as not “too top heavy with brilliance”, but most of Fischer’s barbs are reserved for the Communists, who so eloquently demonstrate the maxim that a little power corrupts absolutely:

He's doing a three-year course at the Communist Party College. Three years! I mean how long does it take to learn to say “Yes, comrade”?

“Has the new Hungary overcome the old three-layered class system of workers, bourgeoisie and nobility?” Roka asked, swiftly providing the answer (before anyone thought he was posing a serious question). “Not quite. There are still three classes in the new Hungary: those who have been to prison, those who are in prison and those who are going to prison.”

You were in jail?

Only for a few days. Bribery.

Bribery. Who did you bribe?

No, the problem was I hadn’t bribed anyone. They were very upset.

There is a recurring theme of characters walking on to observe how bad things have become, saying to great comic effect “This can’t go on much longer.” The reality, of course, is that things can and often do get worse, though most Hungarians seem to accept their fate with a resigned shrug of their shoulders for sound historical reasons: “The Hungarian Second Army, like all Hungarian armies, had the unfortunate habit of getting wiped out."

Gyuri’s brother Istvan has his own way of dealing with life’s slings and arrows: “He had returned from his years on the Russian front with one important souvenir: the inability to get worked up about things that weren't three years on the Russian front.” However, Gyuri sums up his growing discontent thus: “I know life is unfair, I don't dispute that, but does it really have to be this sort of industrial strength unfair?”

"Stay Hungary"

This is particularly the case in the countryside, which would appear to be even worse than the major cities, at least according to the boys:

A place where the shoe was still seen as a daring new fashion idea, where only the sound of crops growing there disturbed the peace.

Years before Jozsi from the ground floor had returned from a summer holiday visiting relatives in Transylvania and recounted in horrified tone: “They actually fuck ducks. I'm not joking, I saw it.”

“Don't be ridiculous,” Pataki had riposted, “it must have been a goose.”

There’s no doubt that Fischer has a remarkable feel for Hungary and its people, which is hardly surprising, as many elements are autobiographical. Although the book deals with his roots, it does not contain many of Fischer’s own direct experiences, though most of it was drawn from stories he heard from his father (who escaped to the West in 1956) and godfather, both of whom were in a basketball team, and from people he met in Hungary when he worked there as a journalist. Fischer claims that almost everything in it is true, or only mildly exaggerated, “although as my sources were Hungarian, there might be more fiction in it than I think.”

"The Thought Gang"

The story aptly captures Hungarian sentiments during the Soviet takeover of their country, yet it neatly avoids too much melodrama, grief or bloodshed. It is all presented rather matter-of-factly, filtered through the eyes of Gyuri and his basketball playing buddies, giving us a fine example of how a novel can take a deadly serious subject and treat it with lightness, humour and empathy.

When Gyuri prematurely contemplates the momentous collapse of Communism, he is more concerned about the impact on him personally: “When he heard the news of Stalin's death, from the radio, Gyuri was shampooing his hair. Apart from experiencing an intense well-being, his first thought was whether the whole system would collapse in time for him not to have to take the exam in Marxism-Leninism he was due to sit the following week.” This is how people must have to bear up under a totalitarian regime, as no other approach to everyday life would be tolerable.

In fact, many of the problems exercising Gyuri’s mind are the same as any other young man: (a) the opposite sex - “1950 was a good year, I almost slept with four women”; (b) studying – “Mathematics had this to recommend it, if nothing else; it made everything else, ants, English, push-ups, ironing, washing-up, beguiling and wonderful. Whole galaxies of interests had popped open now that the maths exam was drawing close; anything unconnected with maths was irresistible.” Far from undermining the significance of the devastating events taking place around them, this technique places them in the proper perspective.

"Smile like you mean it"

The book is structured as a series of vignettes, flashing back and forth over the period. This episodic approach allows Fischer to create a patchwork of anecdotes, rather than attempting to weave a continuous story, which enables him to introduce a host of brilliantly designed characters and adds momentum to the events, while drawing a picture of the social history through allusion rather than detailed explanation.

Given the Eastern European setting and the cast of Kafkaesque characters, comparisons have somewhat inevitably been made to Milan Kundera’s “The Joke” and Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse 5”, but Gyuri is powerfully reminiscent of two great literary characters: Holden Caulfield for his escapades with authority, education and women in J.D. Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye”; and Frédéric Moreau as a young man lost in a revolution in Gustave Flaubert’s “Sentimental Education”. The comedy shares something in tone with Joseph Heller’s “Catch-22”.

"Machine Gun Etiquette"

Whatever the literary style, most importantly the book is very funny, crackling with the wicked, bittersweet humour and eloquent language that is unique to Fischer, as can be seen when the hero is confronted by yet more bureaucratic obfuscation:

Finally, he was connected to a voice whose hostility and reticence convinced him that he had at last reached the right person in the right department. “You expect me to tell you this by phone?” reiterated the irate voice. “How do I know you're not an American spy?”

“Look at it this way,” said Gyuri, chewing over this epistemological doubt, “would an American spy tell you to fuck your mother?”

Painfully moving, but also uproariously funny, “Under the Frog” is a superbly written novel that really involves you in the adventures of Gyuri and his friends, culminating in an unexpected, yet brilliant, ending that is simultaneously achingly poignant and deeply satisfying. As one of Fischer’s characters says, “Life is too short for good books … one should only read great books.”

Nice And Sleazy

If ever an album did exactly what it said on the tin, then Soft Cell’s debut “Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret” would be the one. Released in 1981 by the appropriately named Some Bizarre Records, the title was anything but a misnomer for the lurid tales that lay underneath the cover, whose imagery was straight from the sordid streets of Soho, showing singer Marc Almond sneaking a brown paper bag inside his black leather jacket.

Soft Cell were a sleazy new romantic band that walked on the wild side. As synthesizer music took hold, they dared to be different, making innovative electronic music that sounded edgy and a little threatening, as they took us on a journey into a neon-lit world of seedy back alleys and squalid encounters. Tapping into an underground sub-culture of voyeurism and sexual deviancy not previously explored in mainstream pop music, they celebrated decadence and hacked away at the respectability of 80s Britain. “Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret” fully reflected this hedonistic atmosphere with Almond’s lyrics drawing on the darker side of his imagination to create a virtual red light district on vinyl. As the singer once said, “We sing about boy meets girl and lures her into a life of drugs and prostitution”.

"You'll go blind"

Marc Almond was a proper pop star: famous for his flamboyant, unabashed homosexuality, he had the attitude, the mascara, the tears and the heartbreak. His passionate, plaintive vocals were dramatic (even melodramatic), as he sang about the vice world in a frank, confessional way, as if he had personally lived every line. Although his own record company accused him of singing “out of tune”, the vulnerability in his voice hinted at the powerful emotions behind his trashy tales of cheap sex and desperate regret, despite all the camp cynicism. Listening to this album is like reading the most personal of diaries – and an extremely intimate one at that. Almond’s genius was to make the characters in his songs convincing, even as he acted the drama queen in bondage gear – naughty, but nice.

His fellow art school student, Dave Ball, provided the band’s unique synthesizer sound. Standing aloof behind his instruments like a twisted bouncer behind his impish, risqué friend, he created the music with the minimum of kit in line with their low-rent aura, using only a Synclavier (the first commercially available digital synth), a bass keyboard and the Roland drum machine that supplied the distinctive 80s beat. As a short, energetic front man sang his theatrical lyrics in front of a taciturn keyboard player, you could be forgiven that Sparks had been given a salacious makeover, but in truth Soft Cell were influenced just as much by the idiosyncratic synth pioneers Suicide.

"World of Leather"

One of the strengths of Soft Cell’s music was its simplicity, with Ball’s synthesized effects providing a meaty beat for Almond’s wordy vocals in his titillating tales. While their approach was undoubtedly straightforward, the music was fresh and full of life, as the band was evidently energised by making the record in New York, where they grabbed every possibility available. Their voluptuous backing singer Cindy Ecstasy reputedly introduced them to the drug of the same name during the recording process. Their formula was to take classic R&B rhythms and blend these with the icy synthesizer riffs so popular at the time – Northern Soul awash with keyboards. The infectious, inventive beats married with memorable melodies to provide the epic sound required by Almond’s kitchen sink dramas.

Of course, Soft Cell are best known for “Tainted Love”, their enormously catchy cover of a soul classic first sung by Marc Bolan’s wife Gloria Jones. Their darkly subversive version was a massive worldwide hit, completely eclipsing the original, but its overwhelming ubiquity cast a long shadow, as many people only know the group for this dance floor favourite: “Once I ran to you (I ran)/Now I'll run from you/This tainted love you've given/I give you all a boy could give/You take my tears and that's not nearly all/Oh … tainted love”. Although it’s become an iconic pop classic, it still sounds great, even though most listeners miss the more sinister, obsessive aspects of the song that hint at the yearnings displayed on the other album tracks.

"Bullseye!"

A recurring theme of Soft Cell’s records was looking for new experiences, striving for new beginnings to escape their mundane existence. Their dissatisfaction with the boredom and hypocrisy of suburban life was clear in the album’s frenetic first track “Frustration”. The desire to break-out and have fun is encapsulated in Almond’s opening line, when he screams, “Fr ...fr ... fr ... frustration!”, but he really captures the ennui of his day-to-day existence, “I have life/Ordinary wife/I have car/A favourite bar/I have job/A moderate wage/I get the pains/That come with age/I am so ordinary”.

So it should come as no surprise that he’s searching for more exotic activities, which take him into the shabby world of strip clubs and sex cinemas. The album’s sexual motif is clear from the explicit “Seedy Films” and “Sex Dwarf”, which made Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Relax” seem like wholesome entertainment in comparison. The theme is unapologetically in your face from the get-go and it doesn’t care if it shocks or offends.

"Boys just want to have fun"

The gorgeously suggestive, slow-paced “Seedy Films” could not be smuttier, “Sleazy city/Sleepy people/Down in your alleys/Seems that anything goes/Blue films flicker/Hands of a stranger/Getting to know you/And I'm getting to like you”. To a chorus of dirty giggles and breathless female vocals, Almond is in his element as he sings, “Phone me tonight/And maybe we can talk dirty”, accompanied by the haunting clarinet that would be used to great effect on a later single, the majestic “Torch”.

Even more controversial is the outrageously kinky “Sex Dwarf”, which almost sounds like a manifesto for perverted pleasure, “Isn't it nice/Sugar and spice/Luring disco dollies/To a life of vice”. It’s completely over the top, hopefully ironic with its creepy whispered repetition of the title and sounds of a woman gasping from a cracked whip, but it’s also without doubt an extraordinary song that is guaranteed to fill the dance floor.

"Not how I remember Blondie"

These darker urges are further explored in “Secret Life”, which recounts the story of a married celebrity, desperate to keep his sordid secrets hidden from exposure, “In your little black book/You've got the names/And the favourite persuasions/Of the people in the headlines/I'm in there under A/And I'm rated under B/You've got photographs to prove it/And I swear to God it's not me”. Ball’s hypnotic dance beats, combined with a cold electronic soundscape, offer the perfect musical backing to Almond’s account of his depravity, which is sung with a beguiling mix of guilt and gratitude.

In fact, Almond often portrays hedonism as pleasurable but melancholy. All the new sensations are indeed thrilling and exhilarating, but the experience is not necessarily all that he had hoped for. “Bedsitter” represents the bitter hangover after the fleeting enjoyment of last night’s party in a song that simply cries out with loneliness and despair, “Sunday morning going slow/I'm talking to the radio/Clothes and records on the floor/The memories of the night before/Out in club land having fun/And now I'm hiding from the sun/Waiting for a visitor/Though no-one knows I'm here for sure”. Rarely has a song with such a beautiful melody described such a desolate existence.

"Soft Cell ... in a soft cell"

Similarly despondent, the magnificent anthem “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye” tells a story of doomed love. As beautiful as anything to have emerged from the world of electronica, Almond brings real feeling to the blatantly sentimental lyrics as he swings from resigned humour (“I tried to make it work/You in a cocktail skirt/And me in a suit/Well it just wasn't me”) to deep passion (“Take your hands off me/I don't belong to you, you see/ Take a look at my face/For the last time/I never knew you/You never knew me/Say hello, goodbye”). It’s a big, bold, lush production that, even today, raises the hairs on your arms. After listening to Almond’s Scott Walker impression here, nobody could say that synthesizer music lacked soul.

The whimsical “Youth” is even sadder, giving the perspective of a fading beauty, which was particularly important in the fashion conscious 80s and is still relevant today, “Youth has gone/I heard you say/It doesn't matter/Anyway/Don't hide the photos/Or turn off the lights/I'm quite sure we've both seen/Funnier sights”. Once again, it returns to Almond’s fear of ending up on his own.

"Marks for artistic impression"

Looking at Almond’s lyrics, you would have to believe that he suffered greatly, even at the height of Soft Cell’s popularity. While lauding self-gratification, his songs threw into dramatic perspective the downside of club life and spoke of the futility of getting away from the humdrum. These themes recur throughout his musical career, though in Soft Cell he managed the difficult balance of drawing the listener into his depressed state, but also treating the subject lightly – largely thanks to the pop sounds coursing through his veins (along with many other substances, no doubt).

The lively “Chips On My Shoulder” was a bitchy attack on hypocrites (“I'll talk about famine/While cooking my dinner”) and complainers (“I'm making a stand/While I sit on my arse”). In the vaudeville “Entertain Me”, Almond waspishly berates his audience for never being satisfied, “Entertain me/I'm as blank as can be/And I've seen it before/And I've done it before/And I think that I like it/But no I don't like it”.

"Colour Me Badd"

Soft Cell were never quite so much fun again. Following an album of remixes “Non-Stop Ecstatic Dancing” (great title remix), their later albums contained less sex, less humour and were considerably bleaker, as may be surmised from their names, the aptly titled “The Art of Falling Apart” and the prophetic “This Last Night in Sodom”. By 1983, the band had amicably dissolved leaving Marc to his Mambas, before reforming twenty years later to once again articulate a world of desperate disintegration and passionate pathos in “Cruelty Without Beauty”.

However, their music was undeniably influential with the likes of Culture Club, Duran Duran and even the Eurythmics all owing them a debt. You could argue that some groups stole their formula lock, stock and barrel, as two-piece synth bands became all the rage. Yes, I am talking about you, Pet Shop Boys, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and (cough) Erasure.

"I had that Boy George in the back of my car once"

Soft Cell were without a doubt one of the most distinctive bands to come out of the vibrant 80s. They made sleaze glamorous and exciting, singing about subjects that most were afraid to acknowledge even existed. All about “Tainted Love”, but so much more than their famous single, they came with an X certificate – X for excellent.