Michelangelo Antonioni

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – L’Avventura aka The Adventure (1960)

    1951-1960ArthouseDramaItalyMichelangelo Antonioni
    L'avventura (1960)
    L’avventura (1960)

    Quote:
    This ground-breaking film won a Special Jury Prize at the 1960 Cannes Film Festival and established its director, Michelangelo Antonioni, as a major international talent. The plot concerns a yachting trip by a small group of jaded socialites, including Sandro (Gabriele Ferzetti), an aging architect who sold out for easy money long ago, his mistress Anna (Lea Massari), and her friend Claudia (Monica Vitti), who doesn’t fit in with the wealthy jet-setters’ dissolute ethics. When Anna disappears during a tour of a volcanic island, Claudia initially blames Sandro’s emotionally barren behavior toward her. As they search the island, however, Claudia and Sandro grow closer and — when it is apparent that Anna is gone forever — become lovers. Unfortunately, Sandro cannot find anything decent inside himself and betrays Claudia with a local prostitute. Caught in the act, Sandro has a heartrending breakdown on a desolate beach, but Claudia silently forgives him. L’avventura caught many audiences who were expecting a mystery by surprise; as in La notte (1961), The Eclipse (1962), and Red Desert (1964), Antonioni is interested less in developing a logical story than in exploring states of feeling and breakdowns in human connection.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – Chung Kuo: Cina AKA China (1972)

    Michelangelo Antonioni1971-1980ChinaDocumentaryPolitics
    Chung Kuo Cina (1972)
    Chung Kuo Cina (1972)

    Quote:
    A documentary on China, concentrating mainly on the faces of the people, filmed in the areas they were allowed to visit. The 220 minute version consists of three parts. The first part, taken around Beijing, includes a cotton factory, older sections of the city, and a clinic where a Cesarean operation is performed, using acupuncture. The middle part visits the Red Flag canal and a collective farm in Henan, as well as the old city of Suzhou. The final part shows the port and industries of Shanghai, and ends with a stage presentation by Chinese acrobats.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni & Wim Wenders – Al di la delle nuvole AKA Beyond the Clouds (1995)

    Michelangelo Antonioni1991-2000ArthouseDramaFranceWim Wenders

    Synopsis:
    The many ways in which men are fascinated, compelled, and confused by their attraction to women are explored in this four part drama. As a filmmaker (John Malkovich) tries to sort out his plans for his next film, he considers several stories about women and the men who love them. Silvano (Kim Rossi Stuart) meets Carmen (Ines Sastre) and immediately asks her for a date, but despite his attraction, he can’t follow through on his feelings for her. The director spies a woman on the streets (Sophie Marceau) and follows her obsessively, but when he finally meets her, he’s disappointed, despite their mutual physical attraction. Read More »

  • Zhangke Jia – Hai shang chuan qi AKA I Wish I Knew (2010)

    2001-2010ChinaDocumentaryZhangke Jia

    Quote:
    Like his last film, 2008’s 24 City, Jia Zhangke’s Un Certain Regard title I Wish I Knew is a documentary/fiction hybrid about modern-day China. Where 24 City took a personal focus on the citizens of a Chinese town affected by the construction of a high-rise condominium, I Wish I Knew takes a broader view, examining the history of Shanghai as viewed from the present. It combines interviews with citizens, actors, and filmmakers with architectural shots of present-day Shanghai and footage of actress Zhao Tao wandering the city. The film is never less than gorgeous, and there’s often an intuitive and pleasing internal rhythm to how he cuts within and between shots.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – La signora senza camelie AKA The Lady Without Camelias (1953)

    1951-1960ArthouseDramaItalyMichelangelo Antonioni

    The third feature film by cinema master Michelangelo Antonioni, La signora senza camelie [The Lady Without Camelias], expanded the expressive palette of contemporary Italian movies, demonstrating that a personal vision could take an explicitly poetic tack; that “seriousness = neo-realism” was perhaps already turning into something of a truism; and that Antonioni would answer to no-one but himself.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – Cronaca di un amore AKA Story of a Love Affair (1950)

    1941-1950CrimeDramaItalyMichelangelo Antonioni

    Paola is a young, beautiful woman married to a wealthy entrepreneur. She meets her former lover Guido after seven years, but their relationship is marked by tragic events.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – La notte (1961)

    1961-1970ArthouseDramaItalyMichelangelo Antonioni

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    Quote:
    One of the masterworks of 1960s cinema, La notte [The Night] marked yet another development in the continuous stylistic evolution of its director, Michelangelo Antonioni — even as it solidified his reputation as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. La notte is Antonioni’s “Twilight of the Gods”, but composed in cinematic terms. Examined from a crane-shot, it’s a sprawling study of Italy’s upper middle-class; seen in close-up, it’s an x-ray of modern man’s psychic desolation. Two of the giants of film-acting come together as a married couple living in crisis: Marcello Mastroianni (La dolce vita, 8 1/2) and Jeanne Moreau (Jules et Jim, Bay of Angels). He is a renowned author and “public intellectual”; she is “the wife”. Over the course of one day and the night into which it inevitably bleeds, the pair will come to re-examine their emotional bonds, and grapple with the question of whether love and communication are even possible in a world built out of profligate idylls and sexual hysteria.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – I vinti AKA The Vanquished (1953)

    1951-1960CrimeDramaItalyMichelangelo Antonioni

    Quote:
    A trilogy of stories of well-off youths who commit murders. In the French episode, a group of high school students kill one of their colleagues for his money. In the Italian episode, a university student’s involved in smuggling cigarettes. In the English episode, a lazy poet finds the body of a woman on the downs, and tries to sell his story to the press.Read More »

  • Michelangelo Antonioni – Sette canne, un vestito (1949)

    1941-1950DocumentaryItalyMichelangelo AntonioniShort Film

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    short documentary on the production of rayon, shot in Torviscosa (Italy). It portrays the production of this new synthetic fabric in the small town of Torviscosa, entirely built following strict fascist canons.Read More »

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