Robin Russin
Summary
My presentation was about the site-specific intellectual, emotional, symbolic and thematic issues that Venice as a location has provided for filmmakers through the years,from adaptations of Shakespeare’s Venetian plays to films by Lucchino Visconti, Nicolas Roeg, Lasse Hallström and others. It was an expansion of a lecture Murray invited me to give at UC Santa Cruz this past November.
Venice, as with other locations rich in history, has certain specific associations. With Berlin or Prague, for instance, the associations, as well as often the stories themselves, deal with espionage, “free-world” vs. “iron-curtain,” and post-Cold War international intrigue; London’s subtext tends to underscore class conflict, empire and post-colonial issues, along with moral or social constraints or their subversions; Hong Kong represents the explosive economic and political interaction of “the forbidden east” with the west; and so forth.
Venice, from the time it first entered literature, let alone filmmaking, has presented several distinct but related subtextual currents or narratives: its beauty and history of
courtesan culture makes it a natural location for stories about the power of sex and the struggle for power in the “battle of the sexes” and the overpowering nature of emotion in general; the dreamlike, floating city, always apparently in danger of sinking, suggests the plunge into the subconscious and even death; while its history of being a freewheeling crossroads of the world and post-Napoleonic attitudes regarding it as a dissolute shadow of its former glory make Venice a suitable backdrop for tales dealing with the illusory nature of social, economic and national stability, with moral and ethnic relativism, and with decay. As George von der Lippe writes in his article on Death in Venice, “Venice itself beckons and tantalizes the stranger, its outward facade barely concealing an essence of lush decay . . . Venice ultimately mocks these lovers, for a rebirth of the sensual and erotic servesonly as the prelude to death, the stay in Venice an illusory state made sweeter by the dawning awareness of death's immediate proximity.”
While obviously not a film, the Renaissance novel “Hypnerotomachia Polifili,” first published in 1499 by the Venetian Aldus Mantius, sets the tone for future narratives: a young man enters a labyrinthine wood, as dreams within dreams lead him in search of his lover; upon finally finding her, he awakes to the realization that she has vanished—and perhaps never existed at all.
Referring to the titles listed below, I examined Venice in films in relationship to the following categories:
THE FIRST MELTING POT, EGALITARIANISM
DEFIANCE OF RELIGION AND SEXUAL/INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM
THE BATTLE OF THE SEXES
THE “CARNIVAL” OF SEXUAL DESIRE
THE MASK, THE NUDE, AND SEXUAL AMBIGUITY
“FALLING IN,” GONDOLAS AND WHAT LIES BENEATH
ENTERING THE LABYRINTH: THE DREAM STATE, FOLLOWED BY
EMERGENCE
INTO COLD REALITY OR SUBMERGENCE INTO DEATH
BETRAYAL OF THE FATHER BY THE DAUGHTER
My plan is to develop this talk into an article for the
Venetian Anthology, or perhaps even a book.
Films (in the order of presentation, related to theme; needless to say, I was overly ambitious and didn't get to all of my clips in the hour provided . . . !):
MERCHANT OF VENICE (2005)
OTHELLO (ORSON WELLES VERSION, 1952)
DANGEROUS BEAUTY (1998)
CASANOVA (2005)
A LITTLE ROMANCE (1979)
EVERYONE SAYS I LOVE YOU (1996)
SUMMERTIME (1954)
DON’T LOOK NOW (1971)
LA FEMME NIKITA (1990)
NOTTI BIANCHE (1957)
COMFORT OF STRANGERS (1981)
THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY (1999)
THE ITALIAN JOB (2003)
LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN (2003)
CASINO ROYALE (2006)
WINGS OF THE DOVE (1997)
SENSO (1954)
SENSO ‘45 (2002)
CAPRICCIO VENEZIANO (2002)
EYES WIDE SHUT (1999)
DEATH IN VENICE (1971)
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Paper if in web format.
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