Eureka is a 1983 epic psychological drama thriller film directed by Nicolas Roeg, and starring Gene Hackman, Rutger Hauer, Theresa Russell, Mickey Rourke, and Joe Pesci. It follows the life of a gold prospector who becomes one of the world's wealthiest men after striking gold in 1925, but, 20 years on, fears that he is being preyed upon by his daughter and her social-climbing husband, as well as a mobster attempting to usurp the Caribbean island he owns. The screenplay is loosely based on the unsolved murder of Sir Harry Oakes in the Bahamas in 1943, and partly adapted from the nonfiction book Who Killed Harry Oakes? by Marshall Houts. The film's title is derived from the 1894 essay of the same title by Edgar Allan Poe.
Roeg and screenwriter Paul Mayersberg developed the film over a two-year period, with an extensive screenplay that at one point ran 1,800 pages. Roeg originally intended to use the real names of the individuals involved, but instead opted to use pseudonyms to avoid potential legal action. An international co-production between the United Kingdom and United States, the film marked Roeg's first major studio project, produced under United Artists. Principal photography began in late 1981 in Barkerville, British Columbia, with additional location shooting taking place in Miami and Jamaica in early 1982. Interiors were filmed in England in the spring of 1982 at EMI-Elstree Studios and Twickenham Film Studios.
Eureka first received a theatrical release in London on 5 May 1983. United Artists temporarily shelved the film from release in the United States, as they were unsure how to properly market it to the public. Furthermore, it was granted an X rating by the Motion Picture Association of America for its graphic violence. The film was eventually given a limited release in the United States beginning in Los Angeles in October 1984 through the studio's subsidiary MGM/UA Classics. Eureka was box-office bomb, grossing only $123,572 against its $11 million budget. It received mixed reviews from critics, with many praising Hackman and Russell's performances as well as the film's enigmatic and surreal imagery, while others felt that its narrative was negatively obscured by its visual elements.
Eureka is widely regarded as one of Roeg's most ambitious films, as well as one of his most significant commercial failures, though it has gone on to develop a cult following.
Plot In 1925 Alaska, gold prospector Jack McCann stumbles upon a near-abandoned mining encampment where he witnesses a maddened fellow prospector commit suicide. Later, Jack discovers a mysterious lodestone at the base of a tree before being surrounded by four wolves. Jack seeks shelter at a remote brothel in the mountains, where he has a spiritual experience with the madam, Frieda, a clairvoyant who tells him the lodestone "found" him. Frieda warns Jack that he will strike gold, but that it will lead him toward a grim fate. The following morning, while prospecting, Jack falls through a glacier into a cache of gold beneath. Jack returns to the brothel—now mysteriously empty and dilapidated—and witnesses Frieda, lying alone in the parlor, die. Jack's discovery quickly makes him one of the wealthiest men in the world.
Twenty years later in 1945, Jack lives in luxury on a Caribbean island he owns, in an estate named Eureka. However, Jack's wealth brings him no peace, as he copes with Helen, his bored, alcoholic wife; Tracy, his headstrong daughter who has married Claude Van Horn, a dissolute, philandering French social climber; his paranoid assistant Charles Perkins; and Miami mobsters led by Aurelio D'Amato sent by Jewish mafia crime boss Mayakofsky, who seeks to acquire Jack's island and build a casino there. Jack's life is entangled with the obsessions of those around him with greed, power, and debauchery against a background of occult symbolism.
Tracy, caught in the midst of her father's hostility toward Claude, eventually decides to break ties with him. This results in Jack lashing out at both Claude and her, whom he comes to believe want to "steal his soul". Meanwhile, under Mayakofsky's supervision, Aurelio continues to vie for Jack's island, but Jack resists their attempts. One night during a rainstorm, Claude and three of his friends attend a Voodoo ritual that descends into a maddening orgy. The same night, Aurelio, along with several of his henchmen—including an associate named Pete—arrive on the island and travel to Eureka at Mayakofsky's order. Jack remains defiant against their attempts to strongarm him and take ownership of the island. Pete brutally attacks Jack, bludgeoning him in the head with a wrench before burning him alive with a blowtorch as he lay helpless in his bed, and then decapitating his corpse with a cleaver. The vicious murder is witnessed by Claude, who returns to the house in the midst of it, as well as by Charles, who was sleeping in an adjacent bedroom.
Claude is swiftly apprehended by authorities, who believe him to be Jack's killer, and he is put on trial for murder. After several witnesses give testimony, including a dramatic testimony from Tracy, Claude is ultimately acquitted of Jack's murder due to lack of evidence. His acquittal coincides with the end of the Caribbean War, but the judge notifies him that he will be deported from the island. Claude and Tracy celebrate his freedom with a formal dinner, during which Claude proposes that they sell Eureka and move to France. Tracy responds that she wishes to give the entire island away for free. Claude, after realizing he will only bring Tracy pain, leaves the house and takes a rowboat to his sailboat anchored offshore as Tracy watches in tears. Jack's murder remains formally unsolved.
Cast
Analysis and themes Materialism Writer Robert Shail characterizes the film as "a mesmerising analysis of false materialistic values". Biographer Joseph Lanza writes in Fragile Geometry: The Films, Philosophy, and Misadventures of Nicolas Roeg (1989) that the film's structure resembles that of Goethe's Faust, noting that the Jack McCann character "strives for earthly power at the risk of losing his soul". Lanza interprets McCann as a stand-in for Faust, with Frieda, the prostitute who helps lead McCann to the gold, serving as a foil for Gretchen, whose "love has no place in the hero's demonic mission". Paul Mayersberg, the film's screenwriter, identified McCann's search for gold as a metaphor for the human desire for "self-realisation".
Additionally, critic Jim Leach cites the dissolution of familial relationships as a key theme in Eureka, writing that the McCann family's "tensions take on the archetypal dimensions of Greek tragedy and Freudian psychodrama". Leach connects this theme to its visual style as well, commenting that "the forces of disorder dominate the film's imagery and structure".
Mythology and spirituality Lanza notes that, unlike some of Roeg's previous films which do not center around a singular mythology, "Eureka draws generously from Kabbalah, alchemy and semi-historical Germanic tales", and describes the film as a "religious amalgam" containing clashes between various spiritual beliefs and ideologies. According to Lanza, McCann's search for fortune represents a "Wagnerian quest" similar that of Prince Siegfrid in Wagner's play Der Ring des Nibelungen, which is in turn based on the German folk legend Nibelungenlied. Lanza suggests that McCann's rival in the film, the Jewish gangster Mayakofsky, exhibits a "Semitic worldview" that "mixes Old Testament retribution with Freudianism". Mayakofsky, who seeks to gain control of Eureka through means of psychological manipulation, ridicules McCann for "having no faith in a world where "there is only one God among us schmucks"".
Screenwriter Mayersberg commented on the film's spiritual and religious themes:
In Lanza's interpretation of the film, he writes that "Roeg's attempt to meld ideologies and myths backfires", noting that the unflattering depiction of Mayakofsky drew some accusations of anti-semitism. Lanza contests the accusations that the depiction reflects an anti-semitic stance from Roeg, citing the fact that, while filming a scene featuring Mayakofsky in a synagogue, Roeg was the sole crew member to wear a yarmulke out of respect.
Production Development
Director Nicolas Roeg was inspired to make a film about the 1943 murder of Sir Harry Oakes after reading the nonfiction book Who Killed Harry Oakes? by Marshall Houts. Roeg pitched the project to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)/United Artists executive David Begelman, and approached screenwriter Paul Mayersberg to write a screenplay adaptation of Houts's book. Commenting on Roeg's inception of the film, Mayersberg recalled:
Over a two year period, Roeg and Mayersberg collaborated on a screenplay that at one point ran up to approximately 1,800 pages. The original draft used the real names of the individuals involved, which was cleared by MGM's legal department, despite the fact that Oakes's daughter, Edith Nancy Lewis, was still alive at the time. In order to avoid the potential of legal action, however, Roeg and Mayersberg opted to use fictional names in subsequent drafts. Roeg envisioned a narrative in which the lead character, Jack McCann, does not stumble upon his fortune of gold arbitrarily, but is instead led to it by supernatural means; this plot element was incorporated through the introduction of a clairvoyant prostitute who directs McCann to the gold cache. Mayersberg noted that this lent an "occult" dimension to the story as opposed to a straightforward rags to riches narrative followed by interpersonal collapse.
The film's original working title was Murder, Mystery. The title was eventually changed to Eureka, inspired by the 1894 essay of the same title by Edgar Allan Poe about the mysteries of the universe. In a 1983 interview, Roeg stated that he aspired to make a film that defied genre expectations: "I wanted to make a film about ecstasy, the many forms of ecstasy. Ecstasy in individual people, and ecstasy as the mystic sense of life. How our actions are connected to everything and everyone around us. It's not a mystery film, it's not a thriller. And I hope you can't put it into a slot. There isn't a slot to put it in. To do so would make it a thing it isn't". available via the American Cinema Papers print archive.
Casting
Gene Hackman was cast in the lead role of Jack McCann in early December 1981. Hackman was drawn to the project partly due to his appreciation of Roeg's previous films, as well as the challenge of portraying a character in two different points in his life decades apart. Theresa Russell, who had previously starred in Roeg's Bad Timing (1980), was cast opposite Hackman portraying McCann's daughter, Tracy.
Rutger Hauer was concurrently cast as Claude Maillot Van Horn, the social-climbing husband of Tracy, while Joe Pesci was cast in the role of Mayakofsky, a crime boss seeking to usurp McCann's island and his lavish estate to build a casino. The Mayakofsky character was loosely based on Jewish mob member Meyer Lansky. In the respective roles of Mayakofsky's henchmen Aurelio D'Amato and Pete, Mickey Rourke and Joe Spinell were cast.
Ed Lauter appears in the film as McCann's paranoid assistant, Charles Perkins, while Jane Lapotaire portrays McCann's wife, Helen. Helena Kallianiotes was cast in the role of Frieda, a mysterious brothel madam who directs McCann to his fortune. Annie Kidder, sister of actress Margot Kidder, has a minor role in the film.
Filming