Le professeur

This is forgotten Italian master Valerio Zurlini's third best film after "Family Diary" and "Le Soldattese." It features one of Alain Delon's very best performances and an equally good supporting one from Giancarlo Giannini. Delon plays a hard-drinking and gambling professor of poetry who is fascinated by the sullenness of a beautiful student(Sonia Petrovna) and gradually falls in love with her. He finds out through his gambling buddies that she is involved in a pornography-prostitution operation of some kind. Zurlini's great film uses a slightly over-the-top melodramatic style to delve deep into the existentialist despair of Delon's character as he hangs around the discos of a very liberal and swinging early '70s post-sexual-revolution Italy, depressed by all the empty people around him desperately trying to distract themselves any way they can. The underlying Antonioni-like theme of people trying to distract themselves and merge into a crowd rather than individuate and painfully grow is very similar to that of "Desert of the Tartars," a film that couldn't be more different than "The Professor" on the surface. Dario Di Palma's deep-focus color cinematography in this film is one of the most breathtakingly gorgeous displays of virtuosity this side of Carlo Di Palma's soft-focus work in Antonioni's "Red Desert."

Daniele Dominici (Alain Delon), a kind, melancholic and probably depressed teacher in his late forties, becomes the new substitute teacher at a high school in Rimini. He shares his life with Monica (Lea Massari), another depressed person, but he seems more interested in escaping from his relationship than cultivating it, finding refuge in a group of local layabouts between cards, discos and parties.

At school, Daniele develops an almost instantaneous interest in Vanina (Sonia Petrova), the most melancholic student - and, coincidentally, also the prettiest. One might wonder if that "melancholy" would have affected him as much if Vanina had not been so attractive. The girl, despite her young age, seems to have a dark past, including an ambiguous boyfriend Gerardo (Adalberto Merli), a shady guy who drives her around in a Ferrari.

Between a cultural exchange in Monterchi and a depressing party at the disco, the passion between Daniele and Vanina grows, even if their relationship seems accelerated by an editing that seems to narrow the story into the space of a week or so. When Vanina is sent away from Rimini by her mother, a convincing Alida Valli in a shrew version, Daniele decides to follow her, after a turbulent love interlude in a melancholic shack on the beach. But life, always ready to put everyone back in their place, does not offer a happy ending.

The plot does not shine for originality, given that literature, cinema and even rock music are full of stories of sex (or love?) between teachers and students ("Don't stand so close to me", just to name one example), and these stories rarely have a happy ending, but it is partially redeemed by the setting in a wintry, decadent and squalid Rimini. And, of course, by the handsome Delon, whose unrivaled charm is here emphasized by a rumpled look and a soft cashmere coat that adds an irresistible touch.

Cons? The excessively sentimental, morbid and obsessive tone, with cultural pretensions right from the title, and a 70s soundtrack that stands out for its jarring, almost unbearable, notes of trumpet and saxophone.

Not a masterpiece, but if you are curious to find out if Delon was a good actor, this film could be a starting point.

As someone unfortunate to have sit through the two and a half hours of the original version, I cannot advise this movie to anyone.

The plot suffers from bad slow placing, the story goes nowhere, and there is so much so messed up that made all my friends uncomfortable as they watched the movie. The cast is okay, but the writing is a solid turd.

You have better out there.

I'm starting to gain more appreciation for Alain Delon after seeing some more of his 1970s work, because he's an actor who proved himself willing to take on more challenging and unexpected roles as he got a little older. I don't think age affected his looks too much (he's almost 40 here, and kind of made to look a little rough/disheveled, but is still typically dashing), but his roles earlier did sometimes feel a bit heart-throbby, admittedly still broken up by films like Le Samourai.

He's really good in Indian Summer, and the rest of the movie is pretty good as well. It's slow but effectively melancholic; not a fun film, but it works well as a character study.

Weak plot, extra weak script and you could see what was next on the agenda from miles away.

The teacher walked around like a PI with his overcoat lapel up even while indoors. Too weak and totally outlandish and straight out the gate the script had him focused on the one girl.

It seems that these producers will find any bit of written garbage if it allows them to have young women get naked for the weakest of reasons.

Even when there is zero chemistry between the two actors. The only bright spot in this softcore porn is that the teacher dies and not soon enough.

I gave it 8 stars, subtracted 6 stars for the predictability of the movie and added 1 star for the death of the POS teacher.