Films/DVD Asylum

Posted by tinear (A) on January 13, 2009 at 12:28:11

as perfect a film as I've seen. Relatively unheralded for a film this fine, it depicts the ostracism to the remote S. of Italy of a fascist-era Turin intellectual Carlo Levi and is based upon his novel.
Gian Maria Volonte, unfortunately only known to American audiences as the heavy in two of Sergio Leone's spaghetti Westerns, plays the middle-aged painter, physician, and political activist thrown into a land that time forgot, a land impoverished by harsh dry climate and the disdain of all-powerful Rome. Volonte had a remarkable career, winning almost all the major European acting awards and starring in a foreign film which won the Oscar. It is his film, I cannot recall a scene in which he was absent. From slight bewilderment and culture shock, we see the doctor slowly adapt to not the elitist culture which rules the town and which occasionally reaches out to him but rather we see him more and more drawn to the peasants and their simplicity, honesty, and neediness.
In any list of the 100 greatest films, Italy always is well-represented. This film surely belongs up near the very top of any Italian or international list of "greats."
A bonus: the unforgettable performance of Irene Pappas a woman often victimized by the economic realities wherein men of energy and drive all emigrate to America, vowing to return but seldom doing so, leaving behind their families and women with little or no ways adequately to care for children.
Since the top Italian directors seemed overwhelmingly to favor Volonte, I am going to search out his other films.
Interestingly, this film made me think of Kiarastomi's, "A Taste of Cherry," in the disaffection, alienation, and resignation of its protagonist.
See both if you yet haven't.