TIFF
Bell Lightbox March 8 to April 12
TIFF
Cinematheque takes a walk on the wild side with it series Pier Paolo Pasolini: The Poet of Contamination, its third exhibition of Pasolini's films. Pasolini’s films to
be shown within the retrospective include Accattone, Mamma Roma, Medea, and The
Gospel According to Matthew, The Arabian Nights, The Canterbury Tales, Teorema,
Hawks and Sparrows, Love Meetings, The Decameron, Porcile, Oedipus Rex and 120
Days of Sodom. They are not for the faint hearted. Anything and everything
goes, interpreted within Pasolini’s characteristic view that life is as gritty,
dark and threatening as it is beautiful and revolutionary. WE spoke with Senior TIFF programmer James Quandt.This is the third time Cinematheque has run a Pasolini retrospective. Why did you think it was important to stage it a third time?
There are several reasons. One is that I maintain the Great Books belief that programming should continually make important bodies of work—especially ones as influential as Pasolini’s—available to new audiences. Four years ago indeed seems like a short time, but as a colleague pointed out to me, in the meantime the 14-year-olds who couldn’t see his films then can now do so. (Our recent Godard retrospective drew a very young audience, many of them seeing his films for the first time.) Second, with the transition to digital, it is becoming increasingly difficult, sometimes impossible, to secure classic films in their original formats (celluloid, 35mm) so I had to leap at the opportunity of Cinecitta Luce in Rome making all new 35mm prints of Pasolini’s work and touring them in North America. We very likely will never have this chance again! And nobody's work demands to be seen on film and on the big screen more than Pasolini's
He was one of the most controversial figures in the history of cinema. I
would count only Rainer Werner Fassbinder as equally controversial. To me they
are both cultural heroes partly because they’re passionate rejection of the
society the country and the state was so utter. They used their art to launch
their devastating critique of everything through thought was false and
distorted around them. They were both homosexual, and it made them pariahs in
their retrospective societies. And both of course had early deaths. Both died
partly because of their roles of outsiders. There was a whole industry of
Pasolini’s death books and documentaries debating the true story. Officially he
tried to pick up a young hustler; he had a taste for proletarian young males,
and was beaten to death on the beach outside of Rome. But many people believe
that his death as actually orchestrated by elites who just couldn’t stand any
more of his voice of criticism in their midst. These are pretty convincing
documentaries. When you look at the police records of the murder there are so
many contradictory statements.
Mamma Roma
Anne Brodie – This is the third time Cinematheque
has featured the films of Pier Paolo Pasolini. Why return to him?
JQ - The
thing I always find when I return to his work and Fassbinder’s, is that their
notoriety overshadows basic facts. What matters most, is them as artists. As
much as they hated their worlds, Fassbinder expressed an appreciation of the
films of Douglas Sirk. They loved people in their specific industry. Early
films like Accattone and Mamma Roma, starring Anna Magnani, and Pasolini was a
freak about her, you can see the tenderness with which he treats people. These
people were a lower class, not largely considered valid subjects for art. Neo
realism changed that somewhat but Pasolini took it that much further. He spoke
from knowledge. Rossellini came from privileged background so did Pasolini but
he rejected his class. He spent a lot of time among the proletariat. One of the
most amazing films in this series was LoveMeetings. In the early sixties, he
went on the road with a portable camera and mic and talked to people in the
church, to peasant woman about sex, people on the streets, it was largely a
forbidden subject, at the time it was not done, with the immense control the
church exercised over society. It was a dark and forbidden subject. It’s an amazing
film, and shows his empathy and sympathy. It’s exhilarating but crushingly sad
because you see society in thrall to a lot of what we would consider now
destructive ideas about sexuality. His courage and bravery were astonishing.
The Decameron
AB - Pasolini’s attitude to violence
is pretty matter of fact. It is as natural as making love or cooking. For
instance, Medea murders her brother with a scythe, dispassionately, while
others simply watch or pretend to ignore. It’s horrifying and there is zero
morality imposed on it.
JQ - The
hallmark of his work is his treatment of violence. One of his novels - he was
poet, essayist and filmmaker - the novel that made him was A Violent Life. That
is a very important feature of his cinema, not the kind we encounter in
contemporary films. This is everyday street violence; the warp and woof of
certain kind of life culminates in his most infamous work Salo, 120 Days in
Sodom, one of the grimmest, most unbearable films to watch. And a lot of people
have interpreted it as self-obituary, that he was writing an epitaph, I don’t
buy it. It does stand as one of the most powerful statements on humanity in
cinema. I forced myself to watch it. Even his story of Jesus is different from
everybody else’, beautiful but harsh.
La rabbia di Pasolini
AB - What is thought of Pasolini
nowadays?
JQ - He was
an iconoclast and revolutionary. What I hope the retrospective reveals is this
other quality this tenderness as an example of the stands he took to maintain
his principals. In the late sixties when Europe was erupting in politics,
transformations were happening. When it happened in Rome, he wrote an infamous
statement that his sympathies were on the side of the police. It runs against
everything you’d think about him, the youth and the society they’re attacking.
The students were the bourgeoisie, from the privileged class; the policemen
were from the lower classes. The proletariat managed to climb up in the world,
by becoming things like policemen. His politics and class affiliation is the
working class.
AB - Is there any filmmaker today who
compares to him?
JQ - The sad
fact is no. It shows that something has gone out of our culture in general; I
can’t think of many filmmakers who put their career and life on the line
frankly with their art, I can’t think of anyone, maybe Japan’s Nagisa Oshima.
Pasolini was incredibly courageous.
More trailers:
No comments:
Post a Comment