Movies, books, music and TV

Nocturnal Antonioni: “La Notte”

The protagonists in the 1961 Italian film, La Notte (“The Night”), are a married couple—emphatically married.  Disillusionment, the weary efforts to understand and console, the fearful concern over having caused pain, the unwillingness to part—these and other realities so frequently subsisting in matrimony are beautifully depicted by director Michelangelo Antonioni.  Beyond this, the film raises the following questions:  Do Western cultures really care about marriage?  Do they care about anything?  Why does it seem as though nothing of substance takes place in our busy but non-communal cities?  (I’m thinking of the sequence in which the wife, played by Jeanne Moreau, strolls through Milan.)

The second half of this near-classic is somewhat too talky, but the movie as a whole is one of the most technically clever, resonantly made pictures I’ve seen.

(In Italian with English subtitles)

English: Michelangelo Antonioni at the premier...

English: Michelangelo Antonioni at the premiere of “Jenseits der Wolken” “jenseits der wolken” at cinema odeon, Cologne. Deutsch: Michelangelo Antonioni bei der deutschlandpremiere des films “jenseits der wolken” am 29. oktober 1995 im kölner odeon-kino. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Previous

You Little “Angel,” You

Next

Fun Fritz: The Movie, “The Woman in the Window”

1 Comment

  1. I actually wanted to write a small comment to appreciate you for all the fantastic pointers you are showing at this website. My long internet search has at the end been recognized with high-quality insight to write about with my classmates and friends. I would tell you that we website visitors actually are rather blessed to be in a decent site with many lovely individuals with great principles. I feel somewhat lucky to have encountered your weblog and look forward to really more exciting minutes reading here. Thanks a lot again for a lot of things.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén