I knew this film would be difficult - abstract, advant-garde, reforming many of the conventional narrative conventions found in movies, as Jarman's films usually are· For my first-time viewing, I made the mistake of putting it on after a rather long difficult day· I had trouble concentrating, and may have even dozed off a couple of time· I realized then that a second viewing was a must·

It is now several months later· I've finally gotten around to viewing it again·

In the 1970s when Jarman made Jubilee I was a member of a small touring theatre troupe· Our specialty was "theater of the absurd" plays which were all the avant-garde fashion at the time· The troupe consisted of half-a-dozen or so actors, and simple lighting and stage props that could be carted around in a Volkswagen bus· We played at libraries, churches, private homes, and even a men's jail in New York City, often several times a week, over several years· Rarely did we have the foggiest notion of what the play was about· Our director's instructions were to read the lines as if their meaning was of the moment clear· Following each performance, we would have a discussion with the audience· And of course, the inevitable audience question - "What was that all about?" And our cheap reply - "What do you think?" What surprised me was that the audience often saw meaning (whether it was the same as that of the playwright I do not know) - and that we were often invited to return the next season·

While some may argue that Jubilee is not strictly "theatre of the absurd,"(to which I disagree), it is certainly of this tradition· Queen Elizabeth I orders her magician to show her the future· She time-travels four hundred years to Jarman's beloved England and does a walkabout· She finds a dystopian society in chaos and anarchy (see especially Jim Clark's Review in the Links section)· Elizabeth returns to her time, were we see her pondering as she walks along the shoreline - "And did those feet in ancient time, Walk upon England's mountains green …"

Jubilee also reminded me of Stanley Kubrick's 1971 film Clockwork Orange, one of my all-time favorite films· Although Clockwork has a more coherent narrative·

In his 1965 book, Absurd Drama, Esslin wrote (as quoted in Wikipedia): "The Theatre of the Absurd attacks the comfortable certainties of religious or political orthodoxy· It aims to shock its audience out of complacency, to bring it face to face with the harsh facts of the human situation as these writers see it· But the challenge behind this message is anything but one of despair· It is a challenge to accept the human condition as it is, in all its mystery and absurdity, and to bear it with dignity, nobly, responsibly; precisely because there are no easy solutions to the mysteries of existence, because ultimately human is alone in a meaningless world· The shedding of easy solutions, of comforting illusions, may be painful, but it leaves behind it a sense of freedom and relief· And that is why, in the last resort, the Theatre of the Absurd does not provoke tears of despair but the laughter of liberation·"

Jubilee was released in 1977 during the Silver Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II· Queen Elizabeth II is the first cousin of Queen Elizabeth I, 13 times removed· That is, separated by 13 generations·

Jubilee is particularly significant now forty years later in our present era of Trumpism.