© 2021 James Clark
Having finally, in the preceding essay, L’Avventura, ventured upon the cues of poet-film writer, Tonino Guerra, one might proceed with gusto upon the second campaign, namely, La Notte (The Night), 1961.
However, before thrilling to a rare lucidity from Guerra, I must describe how wrong my first impressions of this film were. (Not that it matters what I did; but there is a lapse which everyone involved has missed, a crucial mistake.) In those days, Antonioni could do no wrong in my eyes. But an anonymous note which I stumbled upon back in 2013 for a blog , in Wonders in the Dark, concerning La Notte, and promptly forgot, might have wakened me up a bit. The preamble of the “behind the scenes,” involved another fan, shoring up the Antonioni line. “I’ve become fascinated in gradually realizing that almost the full complement of this indie—yes—but also guerrilla art, had been met with censure. It was something of a jolt to learn that the film on tap here, La Notte, hinged upon two great performers (and specialists to boots) concerning problematic incitement, namely, Marcello Mastroianni and Jeanne Moreau, who hated this assignment and did not take seriously the roles they were to sustain. Mastroianni, in particular, spent quite a bit of time on the set quarrelling with one of the writers, Tonino Guerra. And that rancor, with its behind the scenes clutter, cues our special concern here, regarding the precise nature of Antonioni’s pristine closures within complex and even Byzantine involvement by associates, though contrarian with regard to conventional filmmaking, unlikely to have absorbed the unique physicality of his inspiration.”
One more time: “… unlikely to have absorbed the unique physicality? ” The unique physicality was entirely the initiative of that trouble-maker!
Let’s see if I can make amends.
Guerra, the necessary “nuisance,” would have constructed for the Antonioni appellation, a seeming hot intellectual subject, namely, “alienation,” wherein to place a far more comprehensive and far more profound demand. Right from the opening credits, with a steep, steady drop of an empty glass elevator, there is an oblique indication that human authority has stepped back a move. We’re in Milano, with its heady schemes, but that steady fall steals the show. Very soon a moving car with a man and a woman on board, nearly becomes crushed by a wreckless heavy- construction worker. The escapees use an elevator to reach a friend in a hospital. As they approach their destination, we notice that each of them conveys a remarkably vivid shadow. We imagine that the anxiety here (terminal cancer) has been given a graphic form. That form, with its mundane, shadow aspect, can stand as a promise that another force has to be reckoned with, despite being lost to the “realists.” During this event, we notice varying intensity (including that of the victim and the victim’s mother); and, sometimes, also no shadow at all. This forum of potential mystery and potential power consists by way of an agency unseen per se. But when one has an inkling to be fully alive, that constituent will see what one’s made of. The elevator was an entrée. The rest of the saga is out of this world. (more…)
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