Sunday, March 29, 2009
CAPITALIST ROT
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Films was Pasolini's
I saw this when it came around. Roger Ebert has said that it would take time to understand this film and I think that he is right.
I remember it more than most. Not because it is easy to decipher. More because of the way Pasolini presents his "theorem" to us.
A hot young man, Terrence Stamp, shows up as a visitor to a rich family and has at it with them all. Sexually and in some kind of mesmeric way.
Like a bee going around to all the flowers.
The father, mother, brother, sister and maid. He may also have a thing with the dog but we don't know that as clearly as with the others.
The theorem is about what would happen to these people after they were "released".
By today's standards the sexual stuff is not nearly as shocking as it was in the late 60's. Well, not shocking so much as surprising.
I don't think that I had seen homoerotic activity in first line films before this. Perhaps. But here it is nicely done and not in the style of the older conventional homos. No prancing and other fairy high jinx.
The results of this bee to flower mating are quite spectacular and I will leave it to the viewer to get the full impact of the theorem. Worth seeing. Unleash a repressed human and see what you get.
This is a very well done film. The music is fine. One does have the "what is going on here" feeling a lot of the time but I think that it resolves by the end.
The film maker's view of his own rather obscure technique is made clear in the film itself. The son becomes an unconventional artist as his gift and talks about his own work. Not too big a leap to see this is Pasolini talking. It is laid out for us to see. No mystery.
Pasolini had a dramatic life. A communist. Outspoken. An openly gay man. Death obsessed. He was killed, mutilated, by hustler(s).They ran over him with his own car. Some think that he staged it himself.
Given all that, as far as the film goes, I liked it. I liked seeing the theorem play out. I liked Terrence Stamp who doesn't really do a lot except look very sexy and buzz in for the pollination.
Notice how much I have written about this movie. That says a lot. It is worth pulling apart.
I will give it a 3 out of Netflix5.
Caniniana: I asked Franklin what he thought of the part with the dog and he says he doesn't think anything untoward happened. The dog wasn't screwed up like the people were. It was a reddish dog. One of the kind that runs after sticks. Franklin considers that low market behavior. The dog gets a 2.
Labels: best films
