In 2018, in Rome, Italy, the legendary life of Bernaldo Bertolucci came to an end. There are not many works in his life, from the legend of "The Last Emperor" to the indelible stain behind "The Last Tango in Paris". In any case, Bertolucci is a film art genius who masters the art of light and shadow and the palm of his hand.
The film is a wave of people challenging time and space, and Bertolucci is the tide of this rising tide. Whether it is the late summer morning sun of the Parisian opera dream or the last twilight of the top of the Forbidden City, only Bertolucci can let the film capture the top secret beauty of the world through fanaticism and passion.
The son of a poet, he was bathed in a literary family atmosphere from an early age, and won the Poetry Prize at the age of 15. When he was in college, he served as an assistant director for Pasolini, expressing his inner world with a stunning debut film " Grim Reaper " .
Bertolucci and family
"The reason why I made this film is to try to interpret the psychological state of the characters."
Grim Reaper poster
In the next 40 years, every film of Bertolucci was delicate, delicate but sad.
Without Bertolucci, Paris might not have become a paradise for some.
Bertolucci will never forget, of course, the time when he studied in Paris. Coming from a middle-class family, the literary arts of art brought it an idealized and compassionate character, and under the influence of Pasolini, Godard and others, Bertolucci developed a strong communist political tendency.
In addition, the splendor and splendor after the "French New Wave", the poetry and pride of the Parisian film giants, he wandered in the ocean of cinema every day.
Bertolucci with Pasolini and Godard
So in 1964, "On the Eve of the Revolution" turned out to be. Bertolucci combines his emotions, preferences, thoughts, and heards into this film, and with the romance and sentimentality unique to France and Italy, he creatively glimpses the so-called civilization through people's love desires.
"Eve of the Revolution" is the foundation of Bertolucci's cinematic style. In Bertolucci's world, revolution and love are always inseparable twins. In Fabrio's fiery forbidden emotions, you can also see his revolutionary enthusiasm and fantasies. Jumping out of the beating editing and voiceover, it is the eternal confusion of the young protagonist, leaving an indelible mark of the new wave.
If "On the Eve of the Revolution" is a dream that the young Bertolucci is equally confused about, then his "Dream of Paris" in his later years is a return to the basics of thought.
Experienced a lifetime of ups and downs. After the footprints of the East and the Vanity Fair of Hollywood, the heart of the naked child that Bertolucci loved is still a restless revolutionary love that is confused but fierce, lustful and simple. Matthew parted ways with his twin siblings, watching the latter throw himself into a war supported only by passion, and his own fate turned into an ephemera.
The real name of "Dream of Paris" is "The Dreamer", which seems to be the same as "The Eve of the Revolution", like a beautiful dream, but it does not express any director's political and moral position, and the revolution is always on the "eve"; "Dream of Paris" can be said to be a thorough realization of Bertolucci in his later years.
Like love, so-called politics, so-called freedom, so-called achievement, is always a blasphemy. Only the naked child, who is still young, will express his ideals as bluntly as his bare chest and pursue the most illusory dreams. Movies, politics, these civilizations are all fantasies that are difficult to get if they are lost.
Between the two illusions of "Eve of revolution" and "Dream of Paris" is Bertolucci's continuous attempts, explorations and reflections on realism in the dust.
In 1968, "The Partnership" was based on Dostoevsky's "Dual Personality", which recounted the dual relationship between a person and me in the mirror. Full of philosophical thinking and experimentation, cynical murmurs and neurotic thought struggles, "Partner" has a continuation of the new wave.
In 1979's "Luna", through Lacan's metaphor and aberration, behind it is the helpless plea for help from a drug-infested family. Through lust, Bertolucci's lancet-like lens finally cuts through reality. In the Italian neorealist style, he began to change from a utopian dreamer to an observer of human society.
When "The Last Tango in Paris" knocks on the door of Hollywood with the lens of art cinema and Marlon Brando, Bertolucci still turns to another distant and mysterious land. As early as 1969, Bertolucci began to study psychology. The reason for this shift is also interesting — he has developed a fear of too many monologues in his films. In the process of studying psychology, the veil of Oriental Zen was gradually lifted, and Bertolucci's "Oriental Trilogy" was born.
Bertolucci is in China
The Orient in Bertolucci's lens bids farewell to the cramped grayness of the Parisian and Italian spaces and becomes vast, bright and magnificent.
Stills from the movie "The Obscured Sky"
"The Sheltered Sky" and "Little Living Buddha", boldly exploring the vastness and civilization of exotic lands, Bertolucci is most well known to Chinese audiences and the world, is "The Last Emperor".
The painted red palace walls and golden light and shadow, the color of the son of heaven renders the gorgeous, magnificent and atmospheric forbidden city in "The Last Emperor", while entering the deep hall, it is dark and somewhat sad. A strong beam of light spilled into the court through the window ledge. The magnificent enthronement ceremony was worshipped by a young emperor who was in his childhood. Seemingly contradictory things can skillfully react and coexist chemically, which is Bertolucci's unique cognition of "harmony" and the beauty of the East in Bertolucci's eyes.
When the phone first entered the Forbidden City, Puyi gave Hu Shi a call. Hu Shi said That Puyi was just a 17-year-old boy imprisoned in the palace. The same is true for Bertolucci. "The Last Emperor" excavates Puyi's ordinary person identity on the b side of the emperor, showing the smallness and helplessness of a person in the fierce torrent of history.
"The Last Emperor" finally purchased a ticket to visit the Forbidden City, and the twilight Puyi released the crickets in the cage, and history turned into dust, and he eventually became an ordinary molecule in the world. For Puyi, history is nothing more than an innumerable door. In the face of Puyi, who is exhaustively pursuing history, Bertolucci must be sympathetic with compassion. It is this kind of sympathy that allows cold history to break the shackles, let the barriers of culture disappear, and show a universal emotion and value.
As a Westerner, The East in Bertolucci's eyes is naturally not comprehensive, and the Zen meaning, deep meaning and value contained in the "Oriental Trilogy" show that Bertolucci can still carry the respect for foreign cultures and record the aura of his vision and thoughts with the posture of his predecessors.
"The so-called psychoanalytic method is like adding a lens in front of my camera, this lens is not made by Zeiss, but by Faust."
As early as the end of the 19th century, cinema has developed in the direction of realism and formalism. Realistic cinema is dedicated to capturing the realities of events and natural flows, while the latter places a greater emphasis on imagination and creativity, mixing fantasy narrative and photography. Bertolucci's film, on the other hand, is a dream between reality and form. The aftermath of the New Wave created the art of mirroring, light and shadow, while the complex of ideas, philosophies and myths injected soul into Bertolucci's films.
Me and You 2012
Jumping out of the narrative technique, Bertolucci also integrated the essence of painting and literature, creating a unique "literati film". Caravaggio's oil paintings are transformed into the poetry and beauty of "Stealing Incense". In the early years of "Death" and "Eve of the Revolution", through the non-linear editing jump, creating a sense of illusion, and reality is free from the gap between dreams. The poignant sense of the dream created the artistry of Bertolucci's films.
Stills from "Stealing Incense"
Bertolucci's mid-period films use logic to show the signature of personal style. Seemingly abrupt elements that do not coincide with the present are inserted into the ongoing film to highlight the emotional reactions of the characters in the current situation. The light of "The Last Emperor" described in the previous article is so, so is the graceful appearance of the lonely flower, and the same is true of Eva Green's classic venus of the broken arm in "Dream of Paris". Breakthrough logic linear narrative seems to be arbitrary and abrupt, but in fact it is a reflection of people's real thinking. Under the great fluctuations of emotions, people's thinking will never be linear and logical.
"Movies are going to kill me eventually..." Movies, his deal with Faust. In 1900, he longs to break everything, whether patriarchal or traditional achievements; he also wants to shape all new banners, so he strives for excellence, switching between different styles, and still maintaining the purest ingenuity of a child in the face of unknown challenges.
He is Bernardo Bertolucci, who watches over love and existence in the torrent of the times, and still adheres to independent expression and debate in the group. He is a 15-year-old forever child, he has created a utopia with light and shadow, and he has returned to that world again.
P.S. Chronology of Bertolucci's works (reverse order)
2012 "Me and You"
2003 "Dream of Paris"
2002 "Ten Minutes of Aging: Cello Chapter"
1998 "The Confusion of Love"
1996 "Stealing Incense"
1993 Little Living Buddha
1990 "The Obscured Sky"
1989 Twelve Italian Directors and Twelve Cities
The Last Emperor (1987)
Farewell to Berlin (1984)
1981 The Tragedy of a Ridiculous Character
Luna (1979)
1976 "Nineteen Zero Zero"
The Last Tango in Paris (1972)
1970 "The Man Who Went with the Flow"
Spider's Strategy (1970)
Love and Anger (1969)
1968 "Partner"
The Straits (1966)
1964 "On the Eve of the Revolution"
1962 Grim Reaper