Tag: Stefania Sandrelli

REVIEW: Il conformista [The Conformist] [1970]

Jared Mobarak

Slaughter and melancholy. At one point towards the end of Bernardo Bertolucci‘s Il conformist [The Conformist], Marcello Clerici (Jean-Louis Trintignant) turns to Manganiello (Gastone Moschin) and relays a brief synopsis of a dream. He talks about how he was a blind man who needed an operation that only his former professor (Enzo Tarascio‘s Quadri) could perform. The procedure is a success and ultimately he’s left with the doctor’s wife (Dominique Sanda‘s Anna) in his arms. This scene is perhaps two minutes long and yet proves to be the key to…

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REVIEW: L’ultimo bacio [The Last Kiss] [2001]

Jared Mobarak

“With pounds of cellulite and all your insecurities” I really want to love Gabriele Muccino‘s Italian blockbuster of a rom-com L’ultimo bacio [The Last Kiss] because it is funny, charming, complicated, and hopeful. My issue lies in the fact that it’s also awful in its depictions of selfish ego and weak indifference. Maybe this is a product of its European creation. Maybe extramarital affairs are commonplace enough in Italy to be able to laugh them off and accept them as a casualty of war, but I’d be lying if I…

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