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The Conformist (Extended Edition) |
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The Conformist (Extended Edition)
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by Paramount
Sales Rank: 10239
Price: $10.99
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This story opens in 1938 in Rome, where Marcello has just taken a job working for Mussollini and is courting a beautiful young woman who will make him even more of a conformist. Marcello is going to Paris on his honeymoon and his bosses have an assignment for him there. Look up an old professor who fled Italy when the fascists came into power. At the border of Italy and France, where Marcello and his bride have to change trains, his bosses give him a gun with a silencer. In a flashback to 1917, we learn why sex and violence are linked in Marcello's mind.
Viewer Reviews
This is a movie that could be made in any era due to its timeless theme. Fascist Italy, however, is a perfect setting for "The Conformist" where as in all totalitarian states conformity is required, not an option. Jean-Louis Trintignant is perfectly cast as Marcello Clerici, a fascist assassin sent to Paris on a covert mission. Trintignant's slight figure, his humorless, unsmiling demeanor, and his consciously formal dress, including a hat that he cannot do without, project him as the perfect wannabe conformist.
Based upon a traumatic childhood experience Clerici not only has a need to conform he is impelled to take conformity to its extreme; assassinating non-conformists. His confession before his marriage is a brilliant scene and Trintignant's interaction with the confessor priest reveals the heart of his motivation and his sense of self.
His target is a former professor he admired as a student, Professor Quadri. The professor has left Italy for Paris due to his anti-fascist views and is viewed as dangerous by a mysterious arm of the fascist government. The scene where he discusses Plato's cave with the professor is worth the price of admission in itself.
Two beautiful women in his life represent the extremes that pull at his conformist soul as he proceeds toward the intended assassination. Stefania Sandrelli, as his wife Giula, represents the carefree, sensual, emotional part of his life. Dominique Sanda, as the professor's wife, Anna, represents sensuality of a different type. She appeals to his intellect as well as his sense of real love.
When Anna is formally introduced to Clerici as the professor's wife Clerici is stunned and aroused. Trintignant manages to convey both emotions with one look, the sign of a truly great actor. He has seen her in very different circumstances earlier in the movie. Anna provides the tension and inner conflict for Clerici which leaves the assassination of the professor in doubt.
Sanda is quite believable as a woman who could have that effect on a man in real life. One need not suspend a sense of disbelief to be convinced. Without her presence there would be no doubt about the assassination for Clerici. That tension and doubt results in a climactic scene that is stunning.
Bertolucci, in this 1970 release, is already displaying his trademark genius for visual beauty. Even scenes which are ugly are shot in an extraordinary cinema graphic style. His use of light, switching from black and white to color depending on the scene, shows real genius at work. The same cinematographer, Vittorio Storaro, who later collaborated with him on "The Last Emperor," was also a young man at the time of release. The "Special Features" where the two discuss their innovations in the use of color and light is almost as fascinating as the movie.
The "Special Features" also present very interesting insights into the artistic process in film and the dynamism of plot development. The only negative in this movie is that the flashback technique is overused to the point of confusion. All the other elements of the movie, though, show the promise of a great director at an early age.
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