Bernardo Bertolucci: S/D

The five-disc Criterion edition of The Last Emperor I just got from the library may be...too much for me.

man, La Commare Secca is pretty amazing, never heard of it before but rate it almost above anything else of his tbh

'la commare secca' is good, i liked it, but it's totally a rip of 'rashomon' and is so obviously affected by pasolini. which makes sense; he was young, had been working as an ad for the best (?!) italian film-maker ever. it would be crazy if he had NOT been affected by the man.

i know he claims not to have seen 'rashomon', but ignorance is not an excuse!

i have mixed feelings about bertolucci: his style is obviously fantastic ('the conformist') but is similar to the frenchies working at the same time and earlier, and his politics the same as every other italian. the general impression i get from him is that he's riding waves caused by others.

that said he is good at making movies, and i'd recommend everything i've seen from him: 'the dreamers,' 'last tango,' 'la commare secca,' 'the conformist' and 'the last emperor.'

i watched luna, it's pretty much a disaster imo, even if you discount the incest stuff

What was your favorite movie when you were 15?
At the age of 15, my favorite movie was La Luna that Bernardo Bertolucci directed. It was about a mother and her son. She’s an opera singer and she takes her 15-year-old son to Rome with her after her husband dies. Then her son becomes a heroin addict, and they have a weird incestuous relationship together. It’s a beautiful, kind of amazing movie. I sat by myself at the theater, because a bunch of friends of mine were all to the beach and I was like, “I want to watch this movie instead.” So they all went to the beach, and I went to the movie, and it totally changed my life. Years later it was on cable, and I sat next to my mom and watched it again, and it was the most awkward film experience I have ever had.

https://uk.movies.yahoo.com/bertolucci-admits-infamous-last-tango-butter-rape-scene-was-non-consensual-162300811.html

Kind of amazed at the traction and related pearl-clutching this three year-old story (which had been common knowledge for a long time prior) is getting.

really? You're amazed?

The new info is a video where Bertolucci admits it, which wasn't public before? But it's awful that nobody cared when Maria Schneider told about it. The scene isn't in the script, it's deeply uncomfortable to watch, and the actress said that she didn't know? At that point people should have believed her. But calling it 'pearl clutching' is not a good look. A famous director and an even more famous actor conspired to sexually assault an actress on camera, and people have watched and applauded for years. This is astonishingly sick.

when I first saw the movie 20 years ago it was already a gross and stupid scene.

It's a gross and stupid film.

‏@AnnaKendrick47
@colliderfrosty @ChrisEvans Ms Schneider stated this several years ago. I used to get eye-rolls when I brought it up to people (aka dudes).

Poor choices of words by me in that initial post, I admit. But in light of there being so much going on in the world to get angry and/or sick about, the fact that this of all stories is blowing up is just rmde. The video itself isn't anything new (filmed during a public Q & A in 2013), and Bertolucci himself has finally been owning up to his responsibility for the circumstances in creating that scene in interviews for many years now. In interviews in her later years, Schneider appeared to have made peace with it (outside of still hating Bertolucci for his overall treatment of her), even making a joke about it in the Guardian piece that's been making the rounds again. The way this has been twisted by internet pundits, who are now claiming as facts that Brando actually penetratingly raped Schneider on camera (it was simulated), that this sole moment led to the unraveling of Schneider's life (it was part of it, yes, but numerous other factors are being ignored to prove this point), and that Bertolucci and Brando should have been thrown in jail for what they did (which almost happened, since the film was part of a big obscenity trial in Italy in the '70s).

This same people are also boasting about how (I paraphrase) "If I was there, I wouldn't have let it happen" and so forth. YMMV, but this is a major pet peeve of mine. HOW DO YOU KNOW? Place yourself back in the 70s, on that set, minus the benefit of the how many years of enlightenment that you have now over those who were actually there, that crucial advantage of hindsight you have over all the responsible parties at that time. Heavy, huh?

A friend of mine shared this statement from the "Follies of God", a Tennessee Williams page on FB. I don't completely agree with it, but it muses interestingly about this new controversy and how it fits into the current media landscape

Some points to consider: "Last Tango in Paris" premiered in 1972 and was praised, wildly and ludicrously, by, among others, Pauline Kael, who chose to not see the misogyny and evil in the film, but instead compared the arrival of Bertolucci's film to the premiere of Stravinsky's "The Rites of Spring." New times; new ideas; new means of priapic control. Bertolucci and Brando were Oscar nominated. Years pass and the young actress in the film, Maria Schneider, becomes a drug addict and suffers from mental illness. Schneider repeatedly tells people that she "felt" raped by Brando in an infamous scene in the film. (How she feels about a scene in which Brando offers her the asshole of a dead rat is not recorded.)

In 1990, I begin to talk to Brando by phone about the recent death of a mutual friend, Barbara Baxley, and about Tennessee Williams. We speak of "Last Tango," and it is a film of which he is ashamed. It is, he tells me, a fantasy film for old men with crisp imaginations and soggy glands, and women, as they always have been, are props for those organs or those fantasies that will not rise. The script, Brando tells me, was a "crime against women," and a sin for which he will repent. In 2004 Brando dies, and his sister, Jocelyn, shares with me some of the letters she received from people who miss him. One of the loveliest is from Maria Schneider, who acknowledges "long talks" and "confessional nights" and financial aid in her many woes. And now, deep in a night when men seek to make amends, Bertolucci claims the scene of rape was not consensual. Brando and Schneider are dead. A variety of actors bloat and snort across social media about burning the film, and Brando is again flailed. I am trying to not think of the fact that the streaming of "Last Tango" has soared in the last twelve hours. That would not be, I guess, correct.

I do not know what happened on that set. Nor do you. Nor do any of the low-hanging fruits of Hollywood who have wailed the loudest about the tragedy of "Last Tango in Paris." All of these voices were absent in discussion of recent rapes or assaults that were quite real in our artistic and political worlds, however. On those matters, "healing" is suggested. Some things can't be known. But we can continue to elevate ourselves on the corpse of Maria Schneider, and we can continue to feel better about ourselves by hacking away at Marlon Brando.
We do not know as much as we think we do.

Sandy Hook was staged. Hillary wore a catheter and used a body double. We can all become so enervated by nonsense.

In the meantime, women are being abused this minute in ways we could control. In the meantime, people need our help.

I did not mind hearing from my friend Jennifer Pate Pitzel about this matter. Her query was intelligent and concerned. But I do not own Marlon Brando or know everything about him. Nor do you. Do not write to me to express outrage or to discern what "shame" I might be feeling now that someone I knew briefly has been "outed" as a rapist.

The shame is all yours.

Meanwhile, it was a good day for Anna Kendrick and Chris Evans. Props!

I don't know what I would have done in the seventies, but plenty of people managed to make films without sexually assaulting their costars. Not all people were the same back then, and this is so obviously beyond the pale, even for a period of film history that really needs to get it's shit kicked out of it anyway. Fuck the seventies new machismo stupid nonsense, fuck Roman Polanski, fuck Woody Allen, fuck all of them. And yeah, even today, we had at one point a Best Actor race that included both Nate Parker and Casey Affleck, and that's absurd as well. That does not make a filmed sexual assault of a costar any less absurdly horrific.

Your friend is insane. Still saying 'we don't know'? He knows testimonies from all three main people, and it's on camera and still this bullshit? When do we then ever know anything about anything? It's not the critics who are post-factual, it's him, it's pure performative postmodernism. It's possible to both be concerned about rape/assault today + back then, just as it's possible to be both an asshole about Maria Schneider and Anna Kendrick in one facebook-post apparently.

My friend didn't write that, they just shared it from a page they follow run by someone who wrote a book about Tennessee Williams (Follies of God) that Brando had been interviewed for back in the '90s. This page frequently features stories and anecdotes about the actor; the quoted post was the latest one.

Ok, then that other guy is insane. Apologies to your friend.

what did Casey Affleck do?

I just looked that up, it was news to me too

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/11/22/casey-affleck-s-dark-secret-the-disturbing-allegations-against-the-oscar-hopeful.html

Things you were shockingly old when you learned

ok i c

we had at one point a Best Actor race that included both Nate Parker and Casey Affleck

doesnt really have a fuckin' thing to do w/ acting awards tho

acting awards have nothing to do with anything in the world

we hope

I'm not sure what you mean, Morbs. I don't care about Oscars as well. Just saying men still get plenty of second chances no matter how they behave.

My friend didn't write that, they just shared it from a page they follow run by someone who wrote a book about Tennessee Williams (Follies of God) that Brando had been interviewed for back in the '90s. This page frequently features stories and anecdotes about the actor; the quoted post was the latest one.

― a full playlist of presidential apocalypse jams (C. Grisso/McCain), Monday, December 5, 2016 12:58 PM (seven hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it's a ridiculous thing to post anywhere, "no one knows what happened on that set, except y'know schneider and bertolucci who both said the same exact thing, and if you believe them, i'm literally going to compare you with sandy hook false flaggers jfc"

he could've possibly shared what he had to share about brando without being a total moron about it

also luv this new thing where any time someone on social media says anything about any sort of injustice done to anyone, dorks come out of the woodwork to accuse them of virtue signalling

it's like a bizarre form of check-your-priv politics where the only people allowed to talk about it are the victims themselves. to express difficult thoughts about gross bertolucci movies is to possibly risk an ounce of inauthenticity and we can't have that. nihilism is authentic, everything else might be less authentic, don't want to step your toes in those waters. what do a-list zillionaire celebrities stand to gain from saying any virtuous thing on twitter?

Bertolucci responds: http://variety.com/2016/film/global/bernardo-bertolucci-responds-to-last-tango-in-paris-backlash-1201933605/

Have never seen Tragedy of a Ridiculous Man (unmentioned in this thread), screens in NYC tonight. Supposedly rougher, not visually immaculate in his usual way.

https://www.filmlinc.org/films/tragedy-of-a-ridiculous-man/

RIP

Really liked The Conformist but that's about it (The Dreamers is about Eva Green or whoever you think is hot in that). I should try and catch Spider's Strategem one day. From a few screen shots it looks really good.

Yeah, you should try to see that. Based on a Borges story, but you probably already know that.

He never matched The Conformist but every film until 1980 is worth watching.

TSS, yes, and I'm taken with Before the Revolution.

Yeah later stuff reminds of that dusty old quote from John Grierson -sees mark s coming, *ducks*- (about von Sternberg!) “When a director dies, he becomes a photographer.”

I did see Tragedy of a Ridiculous Man as noted above and really liked it. It'll show again in NYC at MoMA's upcoming Ugo Tognazzi series.

On my FB wall is a fascinating discussion of Bertolucci's self-admitted bisexuality and how it barely manifests itself in his films.

does it? in terms of going up to the precipice, The Conformist and The Dreamers seem to have a bi eye. (also Keanu sitting under the tree of life)

The Dreamers scurries away after one footsie scene.

I never developed any attachment to him: The Last Emperor is a fine entry in a genre I just don’t care much for, but The Dreamers was pretty bad (despite the Louis Garrel nudity). I need to catch up with Last Tango in Paris and The Conformist; nothing else in his filmography looks at all interesting to me.

I like The Spider's Strategem and Little Buddha (yes) best.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Friday, August 6, 2004 1

(adding Tragedy of a Ridic Man)

you like Keanu best

I Sidd-hart-ha him

Tragedy of a Horny Man.

This repartee is sparkling!

Last three posts have been the gayest three posts in a row

since when? the last All About Eve hommage?

I detest cheap sentiment.

^beating a dead martini

You're obviously not a woman.

Classic 'Some Italian guy's just died, anyone know anything about him? No?' stuff from the Telegraph.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/2018/11/26/last-tango-paris-director-bernardo-bertoluccidies-aged-77/

I say Bertolucci's career remains a case study in how age withers engagement if an artist lets it.

He benefited enormously from his relationship with cinematographer Vittorio Storaro, who is arguably the more outstanding talent of the duo.

Current links:

https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6071-the-knotty-legacy-of-bernardo-bertolucci

This, by @szacharek, is the best piece I have read on Bernardo Bertolucci's legacy, and a searching, truly thoughtful piece of criticism. https://t.co/07NuKrY1D5

— Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) November 29, 2018

I was about to link to it.

I wish she'd mentioned the later films besides TLE and The Dreamers but a fine piece.

Terrific piece.

I watched his first feature, La commare secca, last night and it's pretty good (murder of a prostitute, quasi-Rashomon style). The producer had a Pasolini scenario that PPP didn't have time to make, so he and his co-writer were told "Write it like Pasolini," who had made only Accatone at that point. (BB had been an assistant on that one)

also it's not really a "rip" of Rashomon in that, unless I missed something, the different segments don't show contradictory events.

Something I would definitely watch:

https://variety.com/2021/tv/global/last-tango-in-paris-making-of-series-1235120987/

I was thinking someone might play Kael, but she figures in after-the-fact.

In a Twitter thread about this, someone says "This seems immoral..."

Depicting unpleasant history is now inherently immoral?

I Love Film...Think I'll move this to another thread.

Last Tango in Paris was kind of boring in the end

Robert de Niro and Gerard Depardieu were very hot in 1900

The Last Emperor is tedious, I want to go back to Last Tango in Paris or 1900. Still have to see The Conformist

The Spider's Strategem and The Conformist are his two best; he never made a terrible film, but even as early as 1900 he was beginning to slide. I'm a fan of many cerebral artists but I think Bertolucci second-guessed himself into a creative impasse.