O Garoto Mais Bonito do Mundo

This is a fascinating documentary, particularly for anyone who knows Luchino Visconti's Death in Venice and is therefore already acquainted with the haunting beauty of the young Bjorn Andresen, who played Tadzio. The Most Beautiful Boy in the World is sumptuously photographed and deftly edited to create a legend around Andresen's main claim to fame - and therein lies the problem. It gradually becomes apparent that the producer-directors of this doco are hellbent on the main narrative being that of a beautiful innocent corrupted and all but destroyed by his youthful brush with movie fame. While nobody ever explicitly speaks in terms of a Death in Venice curse, it's very much implied in the shots of an aged and frail Andresen gazing along the same beach where his younger, more carefree self frolicked while making the film; and in the all-to-clear parallels between the lost, lonely old Andresen and Dirk Bogarde's pathetic, crumbling Aschenbach. What's troubling is that the documentary makers are quite clearly determined not to allow too many facts to get in the way of their myth-making. The emphasis is all on instant fame and the pressures of being labelled "The Most Beautiful Boy in the World" leading to Andresen having a deeply troubled life. In fact, this is 90% of the film, with stern fingers pointed at Andresen's fame-obsessed grandmother and some sly, not-entirely-justified jabs at Visconti for their parts in exploiting the boy. There's much less examination of Andresen dealing with a mentally unstable mother, his mother's grisly death when he was still a child, his loss of his own child to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome or his struggles as a husband and father. All of these likely had a bigger impact on Andresen's life than briefly being a poster boy for youthful beauty, and they can't all be conveniently traced directly to his Death in Venice experience. The filmmakers also curiously omit any mention of Andresen actually having a fairly extensive film and TV career after Death in Venice, leaving the false impression that playing Tadzio not only led nowhere, but more or less destroyed him. Frankly, by the end of this weirdly deceitful exercise I formed the impression that Bjorn Andresen has been more egregiously wronged by The Most Beautiful Boy in the World than he ever was by Death in Venice.

There isn't that much written about Bjorn Andresen and not many interviews that I've read but I formed the impression that after making Death in Venice ( a film I love and have watched many times) he became what they call these days "entitled" and assumed because he'd been lucky enough to land the role of Tadzio (which didn't call for much in the way of acting ability,) the rest of his career should have been one long success. This didn't happen though he has had a number of acting roles during his adult life, details of which were hardly mentioned. I got the impression this change to semi obscurity left him resentful. I've met him several times and this impression was borne out. This unflattering aspect of his character was never explored, in case sympathy was lost I suppose. Although for some reason the row with his much younger girlfriend on the phone did give a glimpse of it!

The film was also very unbalanced, a few seconds view only of the famous film and Venice itself, nothing at all of the beautiful Hotel des Bains where it was set and far far too much time spent on his time in Japan. Very little said about his marriage, which ended after (I originally understood) to be the "cot death" of his younger child but in fact according to him, occurred because he passed out on the child while sharing a bed with him through intoxication. There seemed a distance between himself and his grown up daughter too though they were friendly. In fact I wonder whether this emotional detachment is a feature of the Swedish character and a reason why they seem to find relationships difficult to maintain. So I remain unconvinced that the Death in Venice experience as it were paved the way to a later unsatisfactory life, via exploitation etc. It played its part by raising expectations, but any unsatisfactoriness in later life must be mainly attributed to the kind of person Bjorn is.

I was interested to see he has a sister, something I've never till now heard mentioned, and that his mother was much more present in their younger lives than I'd realised. Yes, an intrinsically flawed personality albeit of an intelligent and not untalented man. I don't think we can blame Death in Venice for that.

Intriguing story, good cinematography but the overall story felt incomplete at times.

Maybe it was the run time that didn't do it for me, 92 min felt too much for this kind of story and what the creators were trying to say, maybe it's the fact that I personally prefer documentaries with more of a "did he or did he not" feeling in their storytelling.

Maybe that's just me.

Never mind besides my review I really hope the protagonist of the documentary finds his inner peace eventually, he seams like a genuinely good guy.

Our sympathies follow this spectral Gothic figure as the familiar tale of instant fame followed by disillusionment is played out.

Not an actor (his acting in DIV minimal and awkward) and defined by his looks, I wish he had followed full time his talent for music. Watching him listening to his own playing of Chopin was revealing. But the musical part of his life is left out of this film and therein lies the imbalance.

Obviously a depressive which may have been inherited from his mother, would his life have been much different without DIV? Impossible to live with and self pitying.

I'm not sure why his grandmother comes in for such blame here. Using opportunities as they arise is not blameworthy. She surely would have wanted him to have a happy life, she brought the two children up and his sister seems to be well adjusted,

Greetings again from the darkness. In 1971, renowned Italian film director Luchino Visconti announced he had cast "the most beautiful boy in the world" as Tadzio in his new film, DEATH IN VENICE. Co-directors Kristina Lindstrom and Kristian Petri document the story of how Bjorn Andresen's life took him from beautiful to broken. It's a tragic tale of how adults wrecked a young man's shot at happiness.

The directors do not shy away from showing both sides of Bjorn - then and now. Clips from his audition for Visconti include a creepy photo shoot where 15 year old Bjorn is asked to bare his torso. Two things are clear: the youngster is quite uncomfortable, and he's truly beautiful by most anyone's standards (except for the "Eye of the Beholder" episode of The Twilight Zone). Modern day Bjorn sports the scars of life. Deep facial wrinkles are the price of decades of smoking cigarettes. A long gray mane of hair punctuated with heavy facial hire help hide what was once a beautiful boy from the world.

When we first meet Bjorn, he's living in a filthy (truly disgusting) apartment and facing eviction. His girlfriend Jessica helps him clean the place, preventing him from having to move from his home of many years. Over the course of the documentary, we hear from Bjorn's sister, a friend of his mothers, his Governess, Casting Director Margareta Krantz, and Bjorn's daughter Robine. We learn of many tragic experiences Bjorn endured. These include his mother, an unknown father, his misguided Granny, and his 10 month old son. Beyond all of these unfortunate elements, we simply can't shake the creepiness of Bjorn's first meeting with director Visconti.

Exploitation is the best word I can come up with - not just for the audition and photo shoot, but also the subsequent marketing appearances at film festivals. DEATH IN VENICE (based on the Thomas Mann novel) has long been entrenched in gay cinema lore, and in the movie, Tadzio (played by Bjorn) is the object of an older man's desire. Knowing what we do of Visconti, and seeing what we do in the audition clips, our mind goes places we would rather it not.

Bjorn Andresen is an unusual subject to choose for a documentary, and not much time is spent on the adult life of the now 66 year old man. Connecting the dots of the tragedies in his life makes his current situation understandable, but this is a man who has taught music and continued to periodically act ... he has a memorable scene in the recent MIDSOMMAR (2019), yet his demeanor and physical appearance leave us seeing a shell of a man. This is certainly not an uplifting profile, but the cautionary tales are plentiful.

In theaters September 24, 2021.