Capturing a woman struggling with her inner-emotions is difficult to capture on film. As a book, one could easily read the inner monologue that our ill-fated protagonist provides, giving the audience a chance to full develop the character in our minds. With film, that opportunity is not there. It relies heavily on both our director as well as whomever is chosen to lead us into the two-plus hour path of self-familiarity. It can be produced poorly (see Jarmusch's Dead Man) or it can be done brilliantly (see the more recent Malick film Tree of Life), but again it relies heavily on the connection between the director and the actor. L'Eclisse falls somewhere in the "grey zone". Directed by Michelangelo Antonioni (my only other exploration with him was the oddity Zabriskie Point) this detailed story about a woman breaking up with her boyfriend, the chaos of modern Italy in the 1960s, and the nationalistic tear between materialistic vs. idealistic is powerful, there is no doubt there. But where Antonioni lacks in focus, he makes up for it in detail. Amateur cinema enthusiasts may find L'Eclisse a bit slow at times, allowing for the more mature viewer to witness Antonioni's depth and control of each frame. It is within each shot that our story develops. Take, for example, those powerful scenes within the Italian Stock Exchange (seemingly more powerful today then when released in 1962), it is within the chaos of those scenes that we see a materialistic Italy born. From housewives to young men, the floor is rampant with those ready (is that the right word?) to win big and lose even bigger. We see the rise and decline of wealth in the same scene, and greed is those little slips of paper being passed around. An archaic Wall Street; the foundation of our future.
Yet, it is these scenes that elongate our feature. It takes it from commercial success to powerful art house foreign drama. This is a beautiful film, with scenes that just stand proud at every edit. One in particular that remains in my mind is when Vittoria (played by the "easy-on-the-eyes" Monica Vitti) stands at a building, looking, thinking, pondering the life ahead, and as she turns (in one quick shot) she watches a horse and buggy go by, only to be juxtaposed by an image of Mr. Material himself, her current flame, Piero (played by the Criterion-loved Alain Delon). Smooth. Simple. Antonioni understood each moment, and despite this not being for mass appeal, the truths behind this feature play to today's audiences. At times, it is difficult to understand what Vittoria wants, and perhaps it is because she fully does not understand what she is looking for, but Antonioni doesn't force it on us. All of this culminates to this very lazy ending (using the word "lazy" in a positive way) that shouldn't surprise. Here are two characters so developed within themselves, that when a moment of truth arrives - they are stronger running away than towards.
Enjoy this film for the stark emptiness that it oozes. Watch this film for the unbundled chemistry between two nonchalant lovers. Observe the history that Antonioni has captured with words like "PEACE IS WEAK" and the facist control. You will not find a fast paced rom-com in anyway, but instead discover an Antonioni passion work, dedicated to the visuals and feel of Rome during this time. In short, a positive release by the Criterion collection.
Review from Eliot Wilhelm from Videohound's World Cinema: The Adventurer's Guide to Movie Watching:
Deciding that they have nothing more to say to each other, lovers Vittoria (Monica Vitti) and Riccardo (Francisco Rabal) break off their affair; before long, Vittoria becomes involved with a swaggering young stockbroker named Piero (Alain Delon) who is working for her mother. The final chapter of the Michelangelo Antonioni trilogy that began with L'Avventura and continued with La Notte carries the director's concerns about the individual's sense of alienation in modern society to their logical extremes. The famous final sequence of the film doesn't even show us any human beings at all -- just the location where we expect them to be and the space the surrounds them. Where such images in an Ozu film would indicate a world in balance with the characters about to enter the frame, the same images in L'Eclisse imply a world in which human actions are no longer effectual -- the landscape is the same, with or without people. It's a view of man's fate that's as bleak as they come, but expressed by an artist of extraordinary talent. If you've seen the first two films in this cycle, you may feel you've gone down this road far enough. Depending on your appetite for the director's world view, L'Eclisse will either be the most uncompromising -- or the most superfluous -- of Antonioni's major works.
Mark: Green highlight with blue stars. Needs, nay, Will be seen again.
No comments:
Post a Comment