Pier Paolo Pasolini Collection – Volume Two

 

 

                                                       Picture     Sound          Extras            Film

Accatone (The Scoundrel. 1961)     C             C              C              B+

Gospel According to St Matthew   C             C               C              B

                             (1964)

The Hawks & The Sparrows          C             C               C               B-

                               (1966)

 

 

 

For whatever reason, some of Pasolini’s earliest films appear on the second Pasolini set issued by Water Bearer, but this is a slightly better set of films with DVDs that are technically a bit better as well.  That includes his very first film, Accatone, which came out one year after Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’Avventura and is a bold debut feature by Pasolini with its classical music clashing with underclass life, Italian Neo-Realism with touches of Film Noir, and Bernardo Bertolucci as assistant director.

 

The title character (Franco Citti) is involved with pimps, hookers, thieves, and gangs in the slums of Italy, adding to the problems, but illicit transfer of guilt is not far behind.  As compared to the naturalism of the entire Neo-Realist movement, this film takes that into a new direction of actual realism that is still tempered with a third aspect:  classical art, its contribution (from Italy in particular) to the world, and its failure to enlighten that world.

 

Accatone is the best of the six films Water Bearer has issued between the two boxes, immediately establishes Pasolini as an auteur, and shows Italy in a new light that would send the filmmaker into a trajectory of self-reflection and criticism that would make him most controversial.  He would especially challenge Italy and its people to think and rethink their country.

 

The Gospel According to St Matthew is another surprise.  This is a low-budget film, but one of the best Biblical films ever made, as it is one of the few good ones.  Jesus is part of a world of Italian peasants, but has two things going for him here not in the Hollywood productions: he is very naturalistically played and he is an intellectual.  With all of the bad pseudo-politicized Christianity and extremism of the last quarter century, this was a great reminder of what the religion is supposed to be about.  Pasolini, in adapting that Gospel, has made the most effective use of quoted philosophy of Christianity the cinema has seen to this day.  This Christ is very knowledge intense, mowing over preachers, priests, and reverends with a second-nature intensity that helps this film hold up incredibly well after forty years.  Delli Colli’s camerawork is also stunning, with its bold use of movement.  Martin Scorsese definitely was influenced when he did his 1988 opus The Last Temptation of Christ, while Pasolini himself may have been responding to what he saw as limits in the John Huston The Bible then-recently made in 1960.  That 70mm version did not offer many words, but might be the most for-real of all the epics by simply not being so fake.

 

That leaves The Hawks & The Sparrows, which is a dark, often brilliant comedy that may be limited to many viewers who do not understand Italian and/or European politics, but works on the highest level of satire personified by The Marx Brothers’ Duck Soup (1933) and Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove (1965) as among the best of their kind.

 

An eccentric father (comedian Toto) and his airheaded son (Ninetto Davoli) walk down a road, talking about life, with occasional stops for flashbacks and funerals.  This is further complicated when a talking crow shows up and starts having an intellectual conversation with them.  Add a great, humorous score by Ennio Morricone, and you have a remarkable film that may also be one of Pasolini’s most existential.  Who says philosophy cannot be funny, especially when more than one is in conflict?

 

The images on the three DVDs are not the best, but are watchable.  Accatone features letterboxed (1.85 X 1) credits, but the black and white footage is full screen for the remainder of the film.  However, the black is really good form the source, so it was still enjoyable, though the subtitles seems to be a bit to the left.  St. Matthew is letterboxed 1.85 X 1 throughout and looks good, as does Hawks & Sparrows.  Cinematographer Tonino Delli Colli shot all three films, co-lensing Hawks & Sparrows with fellow cameraman Mario Bernardo.

 

The sound again is Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono on all three films, and on the documentary on Pasolini included on all three DVDs.  When Water Bearer does a High-Definition format, they will have to go back to the Pasolini foundation and redo these versions, which are too important and will have to do for now.

 

Pasolini continues to find new interest on DVD for other reasons.  Early on, Salo or 120 Days of Sodom (1975) was issued by The Criterion Collection on LaserDisc, then on DVD, which did not last in print very long.  It was only their 17^th DVD release, but the first to be discontinued, resulting in the value of the DVD being driven up considerably.  A high value it still holds, which has made those not in the know ask why the film is so valuable.  Fortunately, Water Bearer’s six Pasolini DVDs are still available, with Volume One containing three more films: Love Meetings, Oedipus Rex, and Porcile, reviewed elsewhere on this site.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo