Lina Wertmuller
Collection (Koch Lorber)
Picture: Sound: Extras: Film:
Swept Away (1974) B- C+ D B-
Seven Beauties (1975) B- B-
D B
Summer Night (1986) B- C+
D B-
The Nymph (1996) C+ B- D B-
Ferdinando & Carolina
(1999) B- B- D B-
The Extras DVD C C+ n/a B-
Lina Wertmuller has been a filmmaker for years when Swept
Away became an unprecedented breakthrough in 1974. She became internationally celebrated and
though she did not stay prominent into the 1980s like so many true artists, she
never faltered in her vision. The new
Koch Lorber Lina Wertmuller Collection begins with that breakthrough and
offers four additional features up to her last theatrical release to date. It is a good sampling of her work.
Recently remade by Guy Richie with newlywed wife Madonna,
the original Swept Away has political context all over the place
intersecting with sexual politics in a way hardly any filmmaker had
before. The original is popular because
of its Marxist discourse of having the “rich bitch” female a representative of
cutthroat capitalism and male (who was her servant at one point) a raw
communist animal. The difference never
totally worked for this critic, especially when the sexual politics have
overridden the political ones and that the communist argument has lost some
power with the fall of The Soviet Union.
However, Mariangela Melato and Ginacarlo Giannini are iconic in the
roles and many aspects of the film exceed some of its datedness. It was a landmark film, though I would argue
that Paul Morrissey’s Blood For Dracula the year before has a better
approach, with Joe Dallesandro as the field worker/animal communist male
battling the corrupt capitalist aristocrat title vampire over the virginity of
several young ladies of various persuasions.
Still, Wertmuller’s vision is distinctive, in the use of color and
actors, their expressionistic looks and other distinctions of the mise-en-scene. Any humor is always ironic, even when it
does not work.
Seven Beauties is an even more enduring
achievement, as Giannini returns as the title character, a thief who is sent to
a Nazi Concentration Camp for murder and has been used to being a master
manipulator all his life. Now, he will
have to see how far his talents can go in order to survive the camp, not get
killed and he intends to seduce a female guard on the camp who is not exactly a
beauty herself. It becomes a mediation
on the human condition and the ultimate expression of her politics and sexual
viewpoint. The performances are great,
but Giannini is especially impressive.
Wertmuller received a Best Director Academy Award nomination as a
result.
Summer Night is a sort of flipside of Swept
Away as a powerful pro-environmental lady of great financial means (Melato
again) cooks up a crazy scheme with a CIA agent to kidnap a head terrorist to
stop him and his group’s environmental infringements. Michele Placido plays the main terrorist as a sort of echo of
Giannini in the prior film, but this is its own separate film and holds up very
well after all that has happened in the 20 years since. The humor works better here than usual.
The Nymph is ten years later and a
simpler story about the title character and her encounters with various men,
but the twist is that she is living through WWII and both sides (Axis and
Allied) closing in, not to mention an active volcano. She is also her own force of nature at only 15 years old. This is a more standard narrative than the
previous films, but Wertmuller still can direct and the look of the film
remains distinctive.
Though she also started to do various TV projects, Ferdinando
& Carolina is a lush throwback to 18th Century Naples and
about if the love affair of the couple can survive more rigid societal class
structures. It too is pure Wertmuller,
with moments that can rival Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon and its
offspring, but is still more comic than many such period pieces are in ways
that can take you out of that period.
If this turns out to be her last theatrical feature, it has some great
moments and as the films progress, she seems to be working through the
male/female relationship on several levels.
This would be a high note to end her cannon on if it is to be that way.
All five films are looking good often from new
prints. The films have the following
aspect ratios: Swept Away & Summer Night are anamorphically
enhanced 16 X 9, Seven Beauties & Ferdinando & Carolina
and The Nymph is letterboxed 2.35 X 1.
Swept Away was a three-strip Technicolor film in its time. The work of the various cinematographers
throughout is pretty good for the most part, with Seven Beauties by none
other than Tonino Delli Colli. Flesh
tones are often exceptional, as are the colors in ways that can be demonstration
quality at times. As for sound, all are
in various forms of Dolby Digital in Italian and English dubs, with Swept
Away and Seven Beauties in 5.1 remixes, Summer Night, The
Nymph and Ferdinando & Carolina in Dolby Digital 2.0. Summer Night is simple stereo at best
and mostly mono, while the latter two have healthy Pro Logic surrounds. Ennio Morricone did the music for The
Nymph.
Extras include a well-illustrated color booklet with text
on these films and a bonus DVD has trailers for all the films except Seven
Beauties and an outstanding 78 minutes-long interview with Wertmuller by
Italian film critic Carol Lizzani. The
result is a fine bonus disc that rounds out a respectable set from an important
director whose work should be seen by a whole new generation. This set will assure that.
- Nicholas Sheffo
