R.I.P. Filmmaker Ken Russell

Maverick British director Ken Russell died in his sleep Sunday at age 84. Russell’s controversial films included the Oliver Reed-Vanessa Redgrave-starrer The Devils, Women in Love, and Tommy, the screen version of The Who’s rock opera Tommy. In the U.S., he directed the psychedelic Altered States, but his collaboration with equally strong willed screenwriter Paddy Chayevsky haunted that film, and the failure of his next film, Crimes of Passion, sent him back to the UK. There, he continued making films, the last of which was The Fall of the Louse of Usher.