Violência e Paixão

This is Luchino Visconti's first feature film after his almost fatal heart attack. He was in a wheel chair and his left side was completely paralyzed. Enrico Medioli's original story about a man who's facing the end of his life, whether consciously or unconsciously seemed very close to the knuckle. I've read a lot of material and talked to people connected to the production before actually seeing the movie. Nothing had prepared me for what the film presents to the audience and I wondered if the film that ended up on the screen was the film that Visconti intended. Starting from the cast: the first rumors that Visconti was ready to go back to work, announced the film with Laurence Olivier and Audrey Hepburn in the roles that went to Burt Lancaster and Silvana Mangano. Anne Marie Philipe and Martin Donovan (the director) in the roles that went to Claudia Marsani and Stefano Patrizi. For what I gather, Olivier was sick at the time and couldn't accept. Audrey Hepburn turned it down, Donovan and Philipe found themselves outside the co-production regulations where two Italian nationals were required for those roles. Helmut Berger was the one who survived all the changes and I'm tempted to say: unfortunately! His character is the one who doesn't ring true. Clearly, Lancaster's character would have seen through Berger's. There is nothing in his character that made me believe Lancaster would feel attracted and fall for. Berger is a prissy, emotionally flabby, pretty boy. He is also unbelievable as Silvana Mangano's lover. The film as a whole takes place in Lancaster's dark and elegant apartment. Against his better judgment he rents the upper floor to this new, rich, beautiful and vulgar family. His world is going to start to collapse under the weight of the young invaders without soul. Solemmn, sad and a bit static the film however has a masterful center that makes it compelling viewing. Two brief cameos by Dominique Sanda as the mother and Claudia Cardinale as the dead wife bring some unexpected oomph to the grim proceedings. Even if I sound a bit down on the film I'm actually recommending it.

From disrespect without size, from total inelegance, apart from the unreasonable aggression of the gigolo, drug addict and leftist, and the jet set fell on the floor, that renovation in a (centenary) property that was extremely unpleasant... However, what follows is exquisite, a beautiful ménage à trois, poetic even, in the final rites a debate that is valid for every film, social criticism, social inequalities, and politics, questioning Franco's tyranny, a melancholic and exquisite outcome, adorable... "The character of the teacher played by Burt Lancaster is openly inspired by the figure of Mario Praz." "The role of Marquise Bianca Brumonti was initially proposed by the director to Audrey Hepburn, who refused to declare that she did not want to link her name to a murky and immoral role like that." "People get married to form a family, and divorce to get rid of it. - And get married again. - No! To be free."

You discover entire his universe in this film who seems be an elegy. a film about solitude. and about family. politics. and love. dark. bitter. cruel. and precise definition of Visconti filmography themes. a film who works in admirable manner against the small not inspired details. more than other films, it represents a confession. honest. and terrible. about a world, about the others, about abdication, about force of challenges. about the way to define yourself.

Luchino Visconti, ailing and partially paralyzed by a stroke a year or two before, managed to finish 'Conversation Piece' (the Italian title to me seems better -- 'A conversation inside a family). He called upon Burt Lancaster to play his protagonist, the retired American professor who has withdrawn from the world, devoting his hours to his passion of minor English 18 and 19 century art and to his books, in Rome. We see not the energetic hero of 'The Leopard', but a tired older man without qualities, in a well ordered arrangement of taste for tradition and patterns and philosophical musing. And his apartment is the embodiment of that world that is not only antiquated but which time has passed by. His is a bourgeois order that belongs in history books or literature. And into his quiet world burst with great energy is the modern temperament of a dysfunctional family of the upper class, filthy with money and decadent. The beautiful Sylvana Mangano is the marchesa who finagles the professor to rent a vacant apartment above his museum like apartment with its stuffy furniture, it corridors brimming with portraits of bucolic scenes from the English gentry or great men and family, It is in a sense as musty and locked away as the long f=vacant apartment he lets for the marchesa's kept German lover Conrad (Visocnti's own lover Helmut Berger), as well as her daughter and friend. And suddenly, the upper floor is transformed, as a contrast, with a modernism that is loud and vulgar and in stark contrast to the professor's mausoleum, as he quietly awaits death, as much as he values his solitude and the silence of his own carthusian-like order. The marchesa is temperamental, demanding and will have her way with her rent lover, if he doesn't slip through her greedy grasp. The professor's world is turned upside down, as he is drawn into this world of his madcap tenants. As such, images of his mother (Dominique Sanda) and his wife (Claudia Cardinale) in brief scenes bring him back to the world he has shunned. And with a turn of the wrist, Visconti has hooked up the older bourgeois order to the new one, but his professor remains aloof until it is too late. For, despite his reluctance, the marchesa, her daughter, her daughter's friend and mercurial Conrad, a refugee from the turbulent 1960 radicalism, in the professor's mind have become his 'adopted' family; yet, the professor maintains his value free mind and refused to become engaged and with responsibility, until the tragic end. And then you have to wonder. Somehow, 'Conversation Piece' sets off bells in our minds today: its vulgar display of money, the absence of responsibility, the money cultural of a decadent capitalist class. Visconti with a year or so from his own death still had a vision of his own class and its failure to live up to values it espoused. It won't please everyone's taste, but it is worth seeing for the curious.

On a second viewing after a 35 year gap, I am convinced this is indeed a lovely work and a major work of Visconti. This is is also one of those rare films that an actor--Burt Lancaster--helped a director to make a great film. (One recalls Kirk Douglas prevailing on Stanley Kubrick to change the ending of Paths of Glory, only to make it a major work of cinema). Here, Burt Lancaster, staked his own money to complete the film as producers backed out noticing the director was ill and could die before the film was completed.

One major fact that I did not realize was the title did not relate to conversations in the movie but was a well known (in the world of paintings) title for a series of paintings. That makes you to reassess the entire film. The film is a study of Italy through the eyes of three generations and their varied values on social interactions, art, politics, architectural design, music, et al.

Once you evaluate the film on the basis of the painter's decision to change the very trees and objects in his painting compared to the photograph taken of the same scene, the movie's stature itself changes. The opening credits that begin with a blast followed by the electrocardiogram graph roll streaming out unattended is a Visconti masterstroke.

That the film was made by the director sitting on a wheel chair is impressive. Is it a film about acquiring possessions or about understanding people? Both. One realizes the importance of understanding human behaviour of strangers, as one educated professor was withdrawing into solitude surrounded by books, works of art and great music. And his life changes for the richer experience in his sunset years. A great film indeed with superb performances from Burt Lancaster and Silvana Mangano. The cameos of Claudia Cardinale and Dominique Sanda do not contribute much except in providing insights into the character of the professor.

Highly recommended for serious viewers of good quality cinema.