Senso, 1954

Another look at Visconti's SENSO induces rapture as we wallow in this opulent romantic and tragic costume drama, up there with Luchino's best recreations of that lavish past: THE LEOPARD, DEATH IN VENICE, LUDWIG, L'INNOCENTE ... films one can lose oneself in. 

This 1954 film has been nicely restored and is a key movie in the Visconti canon now. Alida Valli has one of her best roles as "the wanton countess" - one of its titles then, and Farley Granger was imported to play her reckless, selfish Austrian lover. Massimo Girotti plays her husband. Francesco Rosi and Franco Zeffirelli were assistant directors, Pierre Tosi as usual did the costumes, script by Visconti and usual collaborator Suso Cecchi D'Amico -  but with Tennessee Williams and Paul Bowles as dialogue collaborators. Bruckner's 7th Symphony and Verdi's ""Il Trovatore" provide the stunning musical background to this tale of doomed love, deceit and betrayal.

Venice, spring of 1866, in the last days of the Austrian occupation. A performance of Il Trovatore ends up in confusion due to an anti-Austrian demonstration, organised by Count Ussoni. His cousin Countess Livia Serpieri falls in love with vile Austrian Lieutenant Franz Mahler, but the times are changing.

As usual, Visconti recreates the opera house scenes and Valli gives one of the all-time great movie star performances - overlooked in that great year 1954 - while Granger is adequate and attractive as the wastrel deserter she falls passionately in love with, as he casually betrays her and takes her money which was meant for the revolutionaries. She then betrays him and he is hauled off to be executed for desertion, while she runs mad through the streets ..... its a stunning operatic climax; Or as a review at IMDB puts it: "the wealthy older woman and a manipulative wastrel. After wheedling a small fortune out of her to bribe a doctor who declares him unfit to serve, he dumps her. But hell hath no fury....Luchino Visconti pulls out all the stops, ending with a finale reminiscent of Tosca (but with a twist). Senso is a shameless and unforgettable wallow in Italianate passion." It is one of the great Italian films. More on Valli and Visconti at labels. 

The Carmelites, 1960

A somebe choice for Good Friday: a 1960 French item, LE DIALOGUE DES CARMELITES, about those Carmelite nuns during the time of the French Revolution - The Reign of Terror! This is the same material for that opera by Poulenc with ends with the sounds of the nuns going to the guillotine ... its the same here but we barely see the instrument of death, as the nuns resigned to their fate, ascend the scaffold one by one, apart from one is has been saved, and who will carry on the order. Nun movies include our favourite BLACK NARCISSUS, and CONSPIRACY OF HEARTS and THE NUN'S STORY as well as more salacious items like Anita Ekberg's KILLER NUN, or Anne Heywood's NUN OF MONZA (reviewed recently, Heywood label), and of course Ken's demented THE DEVILS, a fascinating re-view recently (Ken Russell label), there is also the Polish MOTHER JOAN OF THE ANGELS, also circa 1960/61. We like Deborah Kerr's Sister Angela in HEAVEN KNOWS MR ALLISON (1957) and of course Ingrid was that jolly nun in THE BELLS OF ST MARY'S back in those innocent '40s. More saccharine nuns with Rosalind Russell's in the '60s and Loretta Young and Celeste Holm in COME TO THE STABLE in 1949, thankfully before my time.

Here we have the baleful face of the young Jeanne Moreau, compelling as ever, as Mother Marie, and Alida Valli as the superior who takes over from the dying old abbess Madeleine Renaud. Pierre Brasseur is the convent's chief enemy, and Jean-Louis Barrault plays a street mime. 

It all looks marvellously authentic, with those street scenes of the revolting peasants and new 'citizens' and that waiting tumbril ... We follow two new novices to the Carmelite order - Sister Blanche (Pascale Audret) and Sister Constance (Anne Doat) as they become brides of Christ, and then willingly became martyrs in the name of Christian faith and freedom of belief.  A reign of terror indeed. Directed by Philippe Agostini and R.L. Bruckberger, with great black and white images, from the Georges Bernanos play. Poulenc's opera is stunning listening too.

A '50s favourite: Back to the Sea Wall ...

Another Fifties favourite I have featured here quite a bit, but not lately, is Rene Clement's 1957 THE SEA WALL or THIS ANGRY AGE

This is a nice clip of Tony Perkins and Silvana Mangano doing their jive number:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAekQyj7df8

(Somehow YouTube won't let me load the clip, the whole movie is on there too, but in black and white.

There is a lot more on THE SEA WALL (or THIS ANGRY AGE) at the labels below. I loved it as a kid, and it still works for me now, Jo Van Fleet of course is extraordinary as always, and Alida Valli picks up Tony at the cinema! It was an early international co-production, French/Italian and shot in Thailand, from the Marguerite Duras novel. Tony of course went from Silvana to Sophia Loren in his next, DESIRE UNDER THE ELMS, while Clement stunned and fascinated me with his next - PLEIN SOLEIL .... but thats a whole different story. 

My Voyage to Italy - Martin Scorsese

The perfect documentary for me is Martin Scorsese's MY VOYAGE TO ITALY, I missed this whenever it played on television - did it ever play here in the UK? - but at least the dvd is now avalable. Scorsese of course as an Italian-American is the ideal guide through Italian cinema, he grew up watching these films and they have inluenced his work. It is a given that he would have loved Fellini's I VITELLONI (which I raved about here a while back), it is a major influence on his MEAN STREETS.

This four hour documentary charts the landmark films and directors of the post-war era, including Vittorio de Sica, Luchino Visconti, Federico Fellini, Roberto Rosselini and Michelangelo Antonioni, good to see the usually neglected Rossellini given his due here. Given Marty's wealth of knowledge and infectious passion, just watching this DVD is like attending the best film class. He knows what he’s talking about and gives precise, eloquent descriptions of each movie, using his years of experience in front of a screen as well as behind the camera. Most of all this is 246 minutes of one of the great US directors imparting his passion about some of the most important films of the 20th century. It makes one want to go back to the movies and experience them all over again, particularly Visconti's great SENSO, De Sica's UMBERTO D, and those Fellini and Antonioni masterworks. I VITELLONI for instance remains a timeless pleasure and makes me want to see those other early Fellini films.



If you care about the medium, then it is an essential purchase. Scorsese introduces various segments and through judicious use of clips and an informed, eloquent voiceover takes us on a journey of the following films:

• Paisà (1946))
• Rome, Open City (1945)
• Stromboli (1950)
• Europa ’51 (1952)
• Shoeshine (1946)
• Bicycle Thieves (1948)
• Umberto D (1952)
• The Gold of Naples (1954)
• Ossessione (1943)
• La Terra trema (1950)
• Senso (1954)
• I Vitelloni (1953)
• La Dolce Vita (1960)
• Voyage to Italy (1954)
• L’avventura (1960)
• L’eclisse (1962)
• 8½ (1963)

His focus of course is on classic Italian cinema, but a broader view would encompass the sword-and-sandal peplum films popular in the late 50s/early 60s (like GIANT OF MARATHON, Leone's rather good THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES, THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII and the Steve Reeves spectaculars, APHRODITE, MESSALINA (see Belinda Lee label), and the giallo thrillers by the likes of Mario Bava and Dario Argento (Jean Sorel label), as well as the popular Loren-Mastroianni films and the delicious comedy films of Monica Vitti, Alberto Sordi et al (BOCCACCIO 70, LE BAMBOLE, LE FATE etc); and those films from the works of Alberto Moravia (TIME OF INDIFFERENCE (Claudia Cardinale label), TWO WOMEN), Georgio Bassani (THE GARDEN OF THE FINZI CONTINI'S) and those intriguing novels by Natalia Ginzburg (DEAR MICHAEL (CARO MICHELE), FAMIGLIA etc). Other strands of Italian cinema I liked are those Lina Wertmuller films like SEVEN BEAUTIES, the Taviani's PADRE PADRONE and new comedies like LOOSE CANNONS (review at Italian label), and the lesser known films by Alberto Lattuada (THE TEMPEST, DOLCI IGNANNI), Mauro Bolognini (LA NOTTE BRAVA, SENILITA, CORRUZIONE, GRAN BOLLITO, METELLO), Monicelli etc; Visconti's 1952 BELLISSIMA and 1965 operatic melodrama SANDRA (VAGHE STELLE D'ORSA) being my recent re-dioscoveries. I will have to comment separately on the polarising works of Bertolucci and Pasolini!

I have written about these in more detail at Italian, De Sica, Antonioni, Fellini labels ....plus at labels for Loren, Vitti, Valli, Cardinale, Magnani, Mangano, Mastroianni. We sure love those Italians!

Alida, Ingrid, Isa, Anna play themselves!

SIAMO DONNE (WE, THE WOMEN). A 1953 Italian compendium of 4 stories, in a nice fresh print. The 4 actresses are Ingrid Bergman, Anna Magnani, Alida Valli and Isa Miranda all playing “themselves” in little anecdotes from their lives, and we start with auditions for young beauties for parts in the film.

The first is a nice little satire on stardom as Alida is back from America and bored with all the showbiz parties and events she has to attend. Her masseuse invites her to her engagement party that evening, but Alida has another boring company event to attend; on a whim she leaves and arrives all glamorous at the engagement party, which turns out to be a horror of a different kind. She can’t relax and be natural as the star-struck ordinary people make a fuss of her, demand autographs and bring in everyone to meet her. She grabs her mink stole and flees back to her rarified existence (after imagining she could have a normal life with the masseuse’s fiancé).

Ingrid tells an amusing little story about a neighbour's chicken who keeps eating her roses, and it is a nice fictional snapshot of her life in Italy at the time, directed by Rossellini. Its quite funny seeing Ingrid and the chicken squaring up to each other.



Then we have Isa Miranda dedicated to her career and her lovely apartment and the archive of her achievements but suddenly she has to look after a sick child and his siblings and realises what she is missing as she returns to her lonely apartment.



Then its Anna Magnani’s turn, directed by Visconti (as in BELLISSIMA) as the star always late at the theatre as she gets into an escalating row with her taxi-driver who wants to charge her extra for her lapdog. Then Anna sings wonderfully when she finally gets on stage. I enjoyed it all enormously, and its made me interested in Isa Miranda whom I only saw in her later smaller roles.
Next: back to BOCCACCIO 70 and some early Fellini.

Visconti

Today, a selection of stills from Visconti films. Luchino Visconti who died in 1976 certainly left a great legacy of films and performances stretching back to the neo-realism of the '40s and LE TERRA TREMA and OBSESSIONE, and with Antonioni and Fellini remains one of that trio of great Italian directors. Performers like Bogarde, Lancaster, Delon, Schneider, Cardinale, Valli blossomed in films like SENSO, THE LEOPARD, SANDRA (VAGHE STELLE DELL'ORSA), the sensational THE DAMNED. DEATH IN VENICE and his monumental LUDWIG may be his most personal, and that interesting last two: CONVERSATION PIECE and his swansong with L'INNOCENTE in 1976 - one of the most ravishing costume films ever. Did any director do period recreations like Visconti, making films like THE LEOPARD endlessly fascinating and re-watchable. Its a perfect film of a book I love. SENSO from '54 also has a stunning peformance by Alida Valli. Visconti of course was an aristocrat [the Duke of Modrone] and, as per the books on him, certainly lived like one - reports of dining at the Visconti castle recall a lost world of opulence. His theatre and opera productions were also legendary, including several key Maria Callas roles. [He also directed Delon and Schneider in Paris in '59 in a production of Ford's "Tis Pity She's A Whore", a clip of which used to be on YouTube. Michael Craig's memoir recounts how he liked working with Visconti on SANDRA and describes his working methods.]

Romy Schneider has one of her best moments in his episode from BOCCACCIO 70. Claudia is at her zenith in the 1965 drama SANDRA, and Helmut Berger was a sensation in THE DAMNED, ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS launched Alain Delon to prominence. Ingrid Thulin scores in THE DAMNED, Silvana Mangano is almost silent in DEATH IN VENICE but is perfect in LUDWIG and CONVERSATION PIECE, a very mysterious film where reclusive professor (Lancaster) clashes with the noisy Eurotrash family (headed by Mangano and Berger) who move in upstairs. Schneider's mature SISSI is stunning in LUDWIG where Berger is perfectly cast - as are Trevor Howard and Mangano as the Wagners. The whole ensemble in L'INNOCENTE from the Gabriele D'Annunzio story is superb - perhaps only SENSO, THE LEOPARD, DEATH IN VENICE and Kubrick's BARRY LYNDON are more perfectly realised period recreations. The Verdi waltz and that sumptuous long ballroom sequence in THE LEOPARD is something one can experience over and over.

above: Visconti with Schneider and Berger on LUDWIG; Schneider in BOCCACCIO 70, Berger with Thulin in THE DAMNED, which also featured Charlotte Rampling and Florinda Bolkan in eye-catching roles; Berger and Lancaster in CONVERSATION PIECE and Mangano in the same film; right: THE DAMNED. See Visconti label for more on SANDRA (VAGHE STELLE DELL'ORSA). Visconti's '67 film of Camus' THE STRANGER with Mastroianni seems totally unavailable now, and of course his earlier films like BELLISSIMA with Magnani and WHITE NIGHTS are hard to see now.

Cinema Italiano: into the '60s

Popular Italian cinema of the early '50s: TOO BAD SHE'S BAD, Silvana Mangano and Raf Vallone so young in 1949's BITTER RICE, Gina Lollobrigida and Vittoria Gassman, Alida Valli back in Italy in Visconti's 1954 SENSO with her mesmerising portrayal of 'the Wanton Countess', the first pairing of that young (19 year old!) Sophia Loren with Marcello Mastroianni in TOO BAD SHE'S BAD, also '54, followed by Sophia's steamy WOMAN OF THE RIVER which got the adolescent me all worked up when I saw it as a kid at my local cinema in Ireland. Silvana was kept busy too with De Laurentiis films like ANNA and MAMBO, another fascinating one to see now (as per my previous posts on it).

TOO BAD SHE'S BAD is an absolute treat now, an Italian comedy by Blasetti with Vittorio De Sica enjoying himself hugely as the head of a family of thieves whom the rather dim taxi driver Marcello gets involved with as he falls for daughter Sophia whose endless chatter is deliriously funny here. These are just a few examples of early '50s movies for the Italian market, it would be nice to see some of those Gina movies too like the BREAD LOVE & DREAMS series and GOLD OF NAPLES and SCANDAL IN SORRENTO. Then there were those early Fellini's I VITELLONI, and the hits LA STRADA and CABIRIA, Antonioni's LE AMICHE and IL GRIDO.

American movies were already beckoning for Gina and Sophia, Alberto Sordi comedies were popular (TWO NIGHTS WITH CLEOPATRA with Loren, NERO'S LOST WEEKEND with a young Bardot, De Sica and Gloria Swanson), while the Rossellini films with Bergman like EUROPA 51 and VOYAGE TO ITALY paved the way for Antonioni and others. Hollywood also came to the Tiber: this was the great era of Cinecetta and Titanus and producers like Ponti and De Laurentiis. Kirk Douglas was ULYSSES with Mangano as Penelope/Circe, Anthony Quinn was ATTILA (the first of 3 with Loren), Clark Gable was in Naples tussling with Sophia and Vittorio in IT STARTED IN NAPLES while Rock and Gina headed the very popular COME SEPTEMBER. Then of course came Claudia and Monica as that new '60s era dawned and Sophia and De Sica returned with TWO WOMEN as Antonioni, Fellini and Visconti stormed the film festivals...