Is this expensive dvd worth buying new?

At last a replacement dvd has arrived and I can watch this many-layered tale presented by Peter Greenaway. While I have been waiting for the replacement (and thinking dark thoughts about Korean manufacturers) I've had time to read your comments, some of which are very perceptive. However, rather than go over well trodden ground, I shall present to you some new ideas.........

The film (movie) opens with a counter-tenor singing voice - no James Bowman for sure, but who knows, possibly a castrati to get your juices circulating? We are presented with a mixture of bawdiness and deep wickedness by the wealthy peacocks in their elaborate wigs and beautiful clothes. Their dialogue reminds me of a Logic class at Oxford, but is intended to be a parody of the humble but respectful manners of the late 17th century. They are plotters of the worst sort already possessed of great wealth, and like the super rich, they want more and yet more.

The problem of male heirs is a recurrent one in English history, whether it be to the throne or a little down the social orders where women could not necessarily inherit valuable properties and where Wills are contrived to pass estates down via collateral lines to male heirs. Thus we have the basis for a devilish plot to engage the Draughtsman, Mr Neville in a convoluted contract to resolve the inheritance problem.

So much for the basis of the plot. Turning to the metaphors and allegorical characters who have apparently been baffling some of you - the Green Man represents Wild Nature who is for ever creeping into the best and most manicured gardens. To be sure, he is invisible to the Lords and their ladies who walk the grounds unaware and unheeding of his presence. But to the child led by the hand of his uncle, this cheerful nymph spirit is all too plain and he makes comic gestures to the child in recognition. Similarly, when the gardener appears with an urgent message, he captures sight of the Green Man lurking behind some masonry and slaps him hard upon the rump to send him packing. The last scene where he descends from the statue of a horse (already drawn by Neville riderless because his training also, as a draughtsman, has taught him to ignore wild nature, (in preference to the ordered Classical world of statues, monoliths and perpective), and takes a bite from the flesh of the sliced pineapple - a newly imported fruit into England at the period, that can only be savoured by the very wealthy. He sucks the juice of the pineapple and finding it alien to his palate, spits it out in disgust.

This is what I make of THE DRAUGHTSMAN'S CONTRACT at the first viewing. I'm sure that there are other levels of meaning that we can all explore in our leisure moments, but to English culture it makes sense, but to those of you in America, I can see that this is foreign territory indeed!

P.S. I could ramble on about the Dutch landscape gardener speaking in his native tonge. His countrymen were already being engaged in England to drain the low-lying Fenlands in order to create more agricultural land and thus generate greater wealth. It is all part of the allegory that is part-and-parcel of this disturbing film.