The Man Who Fell to Earth

This typically eccentric and multidimensional movie from director Nicolas Roeg (Walkabout, Don't Look Now) transforms Walter Tevis's novel into an enigmatic and chilling mosaic of corporate satire and effective science fiction. In his feature debut, a fragile-looking David Bowie is exactly right as the Swiftian starman who becomes fabulously wealthy from his intergalactic inventions, but soon gets corrupted by such earthbound vices as alcohol, television and sex. An established cult classic, the movie has always divided the critics, but whatever you think about its pretensions, vagueness and illogicalities, it remains a fascinating new-age fairy tale, with Bowie's "fall" open to numerous allegorical interpretations.