La luna

Well well well, what do we have here? Another one of Bertolucci's earlier films? Yes and No. This is one of Bernardo Bertolucci's earlier films (1979), but it is unlike anything that he had done before or ever did again.

La Luna is something that is a gem of film-making history, even though it is virtually impossible to get on video (and it will most probably never be shown on Television again).

It tells the sad, depressing (yet beautiful) tale of a young boy's growth into adolescence , while experimenting with drugs and eventually (as they always do) ends up becoming addicted to Heroin.

His Mother(played ever so beautifully by Jill Clayburge), in an effort to try and 'wean him' off the drugs develops an incestuous relationship with her son.

Shocking as the description above may sound at first, please do not let it put you off seeing this fantastic film, as it is only a small slice of the cinematically glorious outing that this film is!

The photography portrayed in this film is the best that bertolucci has ever achieved (Yes, even the fantastic The Last Emperor and Little Buddah). When I say a film is utterly breath-taking (I am a hard person to please when it comes to films, just read my other reviews here!), then you know you're in for a treat and a half.

But, what is the point of this review unless people have a chance to witness the sheer beauty for themselves?

I saw this film when I was 15 years of age. I am now 26 and have never forgotten a single FRAME of La Luna. Every word, every scene sticks in my mind like a vivid memory, and I in some ways feel that I was in the film somehow and was able to feel all the anger, all the pain and all the love that surrounded it.

For a film to make this much of an impression on someone and for that impression to still be fresh in the person's mind eleven years later, you also know this film has to be a good thing.

You people, I am very sad to say, will probably never have the chance to see this film (as it has not been released on Video - I have tried nearly every day for eleven years to find a copy!!!).

But let what I have said stick in your mind, just as La Luna hopefully will some day...

Not quite sure how I exactly feel about this film. As with a lot of Bertolucci movies, there are plenty of cringe-inducing moments, from the overblown Verdi opera scenes to Jill Clayburgh campily dancing around to rock music screeching "Oh yeah! In the 60s we believed in THINGS!!!" Taken as a whole, the movie is very uneven, psychologically muddled, heavy-handed and overlong. But there are haunting stretches in this movie which continue to resonate with me -- an opening passage where Clayburgh is biking in the night with her baby, and even smaller moments like the strangely beautiful shot of the teenagers skateboarding down the streets of Rome, or the kid dancing to "Night Fever". I would love to rewatch it and hope it get released on DVD. It's a fascinating entry in Bertolucci's work. A mess, but I think it's stayed with me more strongly than 1900 or Tango, though I think The Conformist still reigns supreme.

A childhood memory, looking into his mother's face with a full moon creating a halo around her. Beautiful and so Italian. The mother in this case is Jill Claybourgh, she was raiding the crest of the wave then and it's very telling that she would choose to play a part that required, not just appearing completely nude but making love to her teen age junkie of a son. She is awkwardly terrific. Her face is a voyage in itself. I would have use quite a different wardrobe for her character as well as make up and hair style but maybe that was just a sign of its day. Jill laughs saying "I am crazy" and that would explain some of the dangerous nuttiness she indulges in here. Her son, played beautifully, by unknown - before and since - Matthew Barry. A Bertoluccian teen sex object if I ever so one. The film has oodles of moments to cherish. Tomas Milian plays the boy's real father. They've never met, His father still lives in a rather intense relationship with his mother, the stunning Alida Valli. In small, very small parts, Carlo Verdone, Roberto Benigni and Renato Salvatori. A film to enjoy with your heart, your gut and your libido but not your brain. Just live your brain for other Bertolucci jewels.

I actually auditioned for the role of the son when the mother was originally supposed to be played by Liv Ullman I think I read for it twice but was ultimately rejected because I looked too American in a Tom Sawyer kind of way-the boy who ended up doing it had a European quality in his face which Bertolucci wanted for the role. I saw it twice when it came out in the US, both times at the Loews Twin Cinemas. I remember it as having been gorgeously shot. The performances by Clayburgh and Barry are extremely good. Alida Valli is superb. The opera scenes were fantastic. Why isn't this out on DVD? Will we have to wait until after Bertolucci's death?

This is one of Bertolucci's best films. After the sudden death of his stepfather, whom he believes was his real father, the teenager Joe and his famous mother (played by Jill Clayburgh) depart for Italy. There, the unresolved enigma of his real father, his erotic attachment to his mother, the narcissism of the mother, and his own inability to truly connect with anybody else drive Joe into the world of heroin. His mother discovers his habit, and out of a combination of guilt and her own narcissistic loss of boundaries, first colludes with him to procure the drug, and then attempts to soothe him in his despair through sexual stimulation, and gets drawn into the Oedipal vortex into which Joe has plunged. This film demonstrates with great power the devastating consequences of the failure to resolve the Oedipal conflict. The film is difficult to find in America, but is well worth the effort.