Antonioni

Melmoth

Bruxist
Anybody in London catch any of the season at the NFT? I saw three, L'Avventura, L'Eclisse and Red Desert (with Richard Harris) and was whelmed in a big way. That bleak, antiseptic, neurotic aesthetic: totally Ballard innit? All those factories, airstrips, radar stations, mysterious islands, desolate empty streetscapes and modernist apartments. The montage at the end of L'Eclisse predicts most of David Lynch. The way he uses sound too is very Lynchian: those strange extra-diegetic synthesized noises in Red Desert, anybody know who was responsible for those? Reminded me of Henri Chopin.
 

Buick6

too punk to drunk
I only seen 'L'Aventura' and 'the blow up'...Their impact is expanded when seen in the cinemah - and good drugs. But make sure you're awake as you could easily snooze off.
 

owen

Well-known member
dunno about that- went to see 'la notte' a couple of weeks ago and after 10 minutes thought 'oh no, i really am going to fall asleep through this'- and in the end i had stayed totally awake for the whole thing, interminable party scenes and all

i loved it (awesome modernist apartments), but do agree with something i read once about why people didn't 'get' antonioni in the USSR- 'why are all these rich people so bored?'
 

h-crimm

Well-known member
it is a bit annoying how they are _all_ about rich people, i agree.
but at least these rich people outsiders to thier class normal, and at least some of them are sympathetic. its not wes anderson....

i love the shot where vitti pulls open the curtains at the beginning of l'eclisse and theres that bizarre toadstool building (left over from musolinis attempt to build a worlds fair in suburban rome). the view is so strange and also strangely disappointing.


i find his films like those long slow fall songs when you can feel your muscles willing the pace forward. if that makes any sense. not boring at all. your itching to get going but he holds you down, like being tied down at the best disco you've ever been to; uncomfortable, unexpected but you listen more attentively and you hear.


the red desert is incomprehensibly good as a first attempt at colour cinema. i really loved seeing that film.

i hate it when people say he is anti-modern, he has arguments against parts of 'modernity', but he's clearly fascinated as well. i like how deeply disappointed vitti is with alain delon's old fashioned appartment in l'eclisse.




ugh... uhhh too much
 

dominic

Beast of Burden
i haven't seen l'eclisse -- and judging from everyone's top 10 lists, that's the one to see

i've rented l'avventura and the passenger, and i saw blow-up on big screen

not sure if i've seen any of his other stuff

but i love all that i've seen

(despite my complaints about The World, i tend to like slow-moving, meditative films that purport to reveal truth about the world -- claire denis, the new chinese films, etc -- that is, i'm a big fan of ambition on the big screen)

and generally think antonioni superior to fellini
 
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version

Well-known member
Watched the first hour or so of The Passenger last night; sat there halfway between bored and intrigued and time seemed to both lag and fly by.

It's been years since I saw Blowup and I can't remember whether it had the same effect, but it's clearly deliberate. There's so much space between the dialogue, so little sound and music, so many shots of the desert. It reminds me of DeLillo's Point Omega. There's a thread running through that book about what slowing things down does to your perception of them and how the desert can do exactly that.

passenger-desert.jpg
 
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version

Well-known member
i find his films like those long slow fall songs when you can feel your muscles willing the pace forward. if that makes any sense. not boring at all. your itching to get going but he holds you down, like being tied down at the best disco you've ever been to; uncomfortable, unexpected but you listen more attentively and you hear.
I used the term 'bored' initially, but this is exactly it.
 

WashYourHands

Cat Malogen
I love the framing in Passenger, cheers for the reminder

Seen Red Desert? Monica Vitti in her prime, R Harris. L'Avventura too. Been too long
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Someone I'm a bit lacking on for some reason.... definitely Passenger is one of my all time favourites... and Red Desert is also brilliant but in a totally different way... but somehow I never watched L'Avventura or Zabriskie Point and now my question must be why? Why have I nor seen those films, it just doesn't make any sense, it feels like some sort of huge plot hole that no-one could be bothered to sort out at the right time and so it got through into actual real life, god I'm glad I'm not an actor.
 

version

Well-known member
The last two shots of The Passenger are great; that one long one that moves through the bars and loops back round and the one of the doorway to the hotel with that gorgeous pink sunset in the background.

feca9e84763d89164482d067fb22c26a.jpg


My copy has a bunch of extra features, one of which is commentary from Nicholson. I'm surprised they managed to get him to do it. It's great too. He's much older by this point, voice is a lot deeper, and he's sharper than I expected and picks his moments.
 
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craner

Beast of Burden
Version, you should really start with Story of a Love Affair and go forward from there. It's all downhill after Red Desert.
 

version

Well-known member
My gut said The Passenger and I wasn't disappointed. I watched Five Easy Pieces the other day too, so it was more a Jack Nicholson thing than an Antonioni thing.
 
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