Part of Pasolinis "Trilogy of Life" (Will there ever be new US editions of the others?) Hard to overstate the impact this taboo-busting film had. Though somewhat tamer than Pasolini's following efforts, this was shocking in 1970, and "decameron" became synonymous with sex in subsequent knock-off titles like Decameron Proibitissimo. Jess Franco's "Eugenie" was even re-released, post-Pasolini, as "Decameron francese." MGM's marketing is comically timid. from the cover you'd think this was a Hallmark presentation.Sickened by empty left-wing sloganeering and by the way that hard-won sexual freedom was being commercially exploited, Pasolini's Decameron is an artistic rebellion. The first of Pasolini's colorful, entertaining and highly erotic Trilogy of Life films based on famous story cycles (to be followed by The Canterbury Tales and Arabian Nights, The Decameron contains ten stories based on the fourteenth century works of Giovanni Boccaccio. Capturing the bawdy, earthy spirit of the original, the film romps through its tales of sex and death - of lusty nuns and priests, cuckolded husbands, murdered lovers and grave-robbers, with five of the stories linked by an artist, 'Giotto's pupil', played by Pasolini himself. The beauty of the naked, youthful human body, of the sexual act in all its diversity, of the Italian landscape is undercut by the ugliness of social relations in which the rich, the church, artisans, exploit each other and the poor.
Starring Franco Citti, Ninetto Davoli, Angela Luce.Italian with English subtitles. Widescreen anamorphic - 1.85:1 Available Audio Tracks: Italian (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono) Available subtitles: English, Spanish, French |
|
