Apologies for the delay, I was terribly distracted this weekend by a certain movie that I liked so much I had to see it more than once. This (last) week’s films are an accumulation of what we’ve discovered with the last two weeks; the post-war apathy and dismay and the reflection of Italy’s history and honor during the war. (I’ll apologize now for trying to remember a lot about these films a week later). I’d also like to dedicate this week’s Italian Cinema to Marcello Mastroianni, the MVP of the class who has appeared in the most amount of movies so far. Surprise, surprise, this isn’t the last we’ll see of him. Interested in his other films? Check out last week‘s article! He was also mentioned over at The A. V. Club for the 1977 film he did called “A Special Day”, you can read about that here.
La Notte (1961)
“La notte is not only a film in black and white, but a film about black and white, a giant chessboard on which the characters move by themselves or are moved by chance, to which they have offered up a desire gone dead. White connotes the absence, the disaffection, the emptiness that paralyzes [Michaelangelo] Antonioni’s characters.” – Pascal Bonitzer
A contemporary tale of apathy and dissatisfaction, La Notte is an isolated story revolving around the crumbling marriage between Giovanni (Mastroianni) and Lidia (Jeanne Moreau) over the course of 24 hours. The film begins with the couple having what will be their last conversation with a mutual friend Tommaso (Bernhard Wicki) who is dying in a hospital bed. Immediately the tension between the couple is evident in their lack of physical affection. The movie is built around subtly and body movement, none clearer than in Lidia’s constant loathing for Giovanni just in her unwillingness to be close to him. More obvious is the lack of comfort either has for each other in the wake of the terminally ill Tommaso, when Giovanni can’t even comfort his crying wife outside. This is emphasized shortly after they leave the hospital and Giovanni reveals that he had a sporadic and intimate moment with a hospitalized nymphomaniac, and she spells out her completely disgust with him despite not being surprised by it. This is an unhealthy and loveless marriage that is hanging only on by the formalities.
The above quote by critic Bonitzer makes an interesting point about the film by comparing the monochrome film and the deteriorating marriage which is mostly seen in the film’s final conversation; I believe Giovanni’s logic is just that: he is married therefore he loves his wife, should he admit that he doesn’t love her at all than he has failed emotionally and socially and he has failed her. At the same time Lidia’s logic cast herself in a tragic life as well, she remains in the marriage out of obligation, because she cannot start all over again having spent so much time devoted to this doomed marriage. There’s certainly a sense of listlessness all around, not just for our main couple but for Tommaso who wishes to die in the very small company of his two friends and his mother and more importantly Valentina Gherardini (Monica Vitti), a woman who is accidentally and then unfortunately wedged between Lidia and Giovanni. The focal point of the film becomes a party at the Gherardini residence where Giovanni becomes physically smitten with Valentina so much so that he confesses his love for her even after she discovered he’s married.
It’s really Giovanni’s hypocritical denial about the state of his marriage and obvious lust for a meaningful human connection outside of his wife that creates the tragedy of the movie. There’s this sense of self-absorption that’s so detrimental to everyone around him that it creates a ripple effect; Lidia cannot commit to an affair because she’s so depressed about the state of her life to the point that death seems to be the only escape for her suffering. My professor noted that she feels for anyone who truly understands the ending of the movie; a hurtful conversation that is the bleakest form of truth and loss of love. The stake in the heart being the revelation that the beautiful letter Lidia reads aloud was written by Giovanni, who can’t even remember writing it for her, let alone why. The movie isn’t about heartbreak, it’s about the stagnation of having been heartbroken long ago and only sitting on contempt, letting it fester until that love is a shell of its former self. Its miserable theme is heightened with the rainy atmosphere and the shadowy disposition of the grand mansion that most of the film takes place in. However the familiarity of dissatisfied love makes the film a saddened but lovely portrait that is not to be ignored.
Il Generale Della Rovere (1959)
Roberto Rossellini’s epic war drama treads familiar territory when looking upon it with 60+ years of films of that ilk. The meat of the story, which takes place in the heart of an Italian prison which has been occupied by German soldiers, revolves around the assumption that the titular General Della Rovere has come and assumed a leadership among the prisoners. The most interesting component of the film, one that was seen in Citta Aperta as well was the humanization of the Germans. So much so that the unlikely friendship between Colonel Muller (Hannes Messemer) and Emanuele Grimaidi (fellow director Vittorio De Sica who constantly reminded me of Gene Kelly), is the true heart of the story up until the film’s final moments.
What makes this relationship interesting which in reflection to American cinema which painted the German soldiers more plainly black and white/good and evil parable, is that Colonel Muller at least seems to be sympathetic in a different manner. He’s the least effective German Colonel ever seen on film, he is simply a product of his government. He doesn’t want to torture Emanuele/Rovere, but he’s left no choice. It makes his speech to the wife of the real Rovere (who is in reality dead) rather complex with his sincerity. It’s a real Fox and the Hound; the differences of the Italians and the Germans and what they stand for truly is a matter of life and death but the film is exploring how that has effected the citizens and soldiers of the situation. That also becomes the huge turning point for Emanuele’s character, who realizes the gravity of his role as the General and why the final decisions he makes in the film transcend who he was before entering the Milan prison, but who the General will stand for after he is dead.
Otherwise, the road to this revelation is not as engaging but treading beats of the impoverished life that was at hand during this era in World War II. The over-saturation of war films made this viewing experience somewhat underwhelming, even though it still overall succeeds as a film about triumph of will. But the beats the film hit are predictable and certain deaths are not unexpected. It is the performances of Messemer and De Sica that drive the story and tear the two characters apart internally and externally that makes the film stand out.
Coming Up Next: Comedies! (Finally)