Bernardo Bertolucci

 Bernardo Bertolucci








RANKED:

1. The Conformist (1970)


After the exhilarating and experimental 60s came to a close, there were a group of films that would exemplify the oncoming visual film art of the next decade. One of those films was Bernardo Bertolucci's 1970 masterpiece "The Conformist." The film escapes the metatextual, modern, and post-modern works that would come to cement the 60s style. Rather, its embrace of more old-fashioned expressionist environments, moral explorations of early-century fascism, and character examinations that would come to define the 'New Hollywood' movement of the 1970s made it a crucial piece of work that would even influence Francis Ford Coppola's "The Godfather." "The Conformist" centers on a member of the fascist secret police in Mussolini's Italy who is tasked with assassinating his anti-fascist former professor. Bertolucci examines the internal struggle of the protagonist's ideologies through the visual landscapes that express the duality between control and liberation. Our protagonists' need for 'normalcy' forces him to abandon any sense of individuality in favor of adhering to whatever socio-political structures surround him. "The Conformist" is a complex examination of our desire to conform and the simplicity and ease that comes from shirking one's values and morals. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

La Dolce Vita (1960)

Image
  Federico Fellini's "La Dolce Vita" The famed Italian poet and director Pier Paolo Pasolini once said that Federico Fellini's 1960 masterpiece " La Dolce Vita " was too important to be discussed in the usual way one discusses a film. I absolutely agree. " La Dolce Vita " is not only a monolith in cinematic history - it set a new precedent for how films could be constructed. Its DNA lies in the very components of modern cinematic convention. The themes and narrative beats remain as relevant today as they were in 1960, lending the film a remarkable sense of timelessness. To call " La Dolce Vita " a masterpiece almost feels like an understatement.  The film departs from traditional narrative structure, unfolding instead through a series of interconnected episodes. Marcello Mastroianni stars as Marcello Rubini, a tabloid journalist who aspires to write literature. Navigating the glamorous yet hollow world of Rome's café society, he spend...
Read more

The Silence (1963)

Image
  Ingmar Bergman's "The Silence" There's something very bemusing about Ingmar Bergman's 1963 film " The Silence ." Based on the title, along with the notion that it is the final installment in a trilogy of films centered around 'the absence of God,' I went in believing that it would be emotionally devastated. What I received instead was confusion. Typically, this is a turn off for people. Not I. Confusion, as long as it doesn't signify a convolution in the plot, allows me to enjoy the film on an emotionally deeper level. Despite not completely understanding " The Silence ," I was enthralled by it.  Because the film was released in a post-" Hiroshima Mon Amour ," post-" L'Avventura " world, Bergman gets to craft something with a bit of modernity. By this, I mean the 'plot' is a bit more like the anti-plots found in an Antonioni film.  Two sisters, one with a 10-year-old son, arrive at a hotel in a fict...
Read more

Quai des Orfevres (1947)

Image
  Henri-Georges Clouzot's "Quai des Orfevres" 1947's " Quai des Orfevres " was Henri-Georges Clouzot's first directorial effort after his controversial 1943 film " Le Corbeau ." Clouzot had been banned from filmmaking by the French government for his collaboration with a German film studio financing " Le Corbeau ." However, many didn't quite make the thematic connections with " Le Corbeau "'s anti-Nazi sentiment and felt that the film was critiquing France itself. One Clouzot's ban was lifted, he decided to adapt Stanislas-Andre Steeman's 1942 novel " L'egitime defense ."  Clouzot's film focuses on a married couple, Maurice Martineau and his theater performing wife, Jenny Lamour. After Jenny becomes acquainted with a sleazy businessman, Brignon, who promises her a film deal, the jealous Maurice goes to Brignon's home to kill him only to find him already dead. A police procedure initiated...
Read more