A triple feature collection from revered Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini. Accatone (1961): Pasolini's first film is a painfully realistic study of a pimp in Rome. Vittorio Accattone has never worked a day in his life and has apparently made a good living prostituting his female companion Maddalena. But her arrest begins his decline; hungry he begs from churches and even visits his estranged wife and son. When Stella a lovely and unbelievably innocent peasant worker enters his life Accattone tries to find a way honest or not to bring back good fortune...... RoGoPaG (Dir. Pier Paolo Pasolini Jean Luc Godard Ugo Gregoretti Roberto Rossellini 1963): RoGoPag is an anthology of four short films by a quartet of world-renowned directors. Roberto Rosselini's Illibatezza (Virginity) chronicles a beautiful Italian stewardess's efforts to dissuade a desperate American suitor despite his near-psychotic persistence. Pier Paolo Pasolini's controversial La Ricotta (Curd Cheese) takes an irony-laden look at the bizarre goings-on during a film shoot that aims to re-create the Biblical story of Jesus (starring Orson Welles as an incredibly pretentious director). Jean-Luc Godard's Il Nuevo Mondo (New World) equates the ending of a problematic love affair with a tragic nuclear holocaust. And finally Ugo Gregoretti's Il Pollo Ruspante (Range-Grown Chicken) takes a comedic - and tragic - look at the world of advertising as a young family treks into the country to contemplate buying a plot of land. With these shorts each director takes time to further explore the themes that permeate their feature-length works focusing on issues of religion jealousy and corporate influence in the early 1960s. Love Meetings (1965): Microphone in hand Pier Paolo Pasolini asks Italians to talk about sex: he asks children where babies come from young and old women if they are men's equals men and women if a woman's virginity matters how they view homosexuals how sex and honor connect if divorce should be legal and if they support closing the brothels (the Merlina Act). He periodically checks in with Alberto Moravia and Cesare Musatti. Bersani is intrusive and judgemental prodding those who answer. The film's thesis: despite the booming post-war economy Italians' attitudes toward sex are either rigidly Medieval (the poor and the South) or muddled and self-censoring (the bourgeoisie and the North). [show more]
Pasolini is rightfully revered: poet, novelist, essayist, thorn in the side of the authorities and film maker. Was he killed by the powers that be and/or the mafia? The investigation never found out ... But he was kicked out of the Italian Communist Party for being gay ... and, as a gay communist, made the widely accepted (even from religious folk) greatest film about Jesus Christ ever made.
So ... this boxset contains three of his films and one of his books. The films are his first one about a young Roman pimp - Accatone.
Accatone is a pretty great film. Visually striking and poetic.
The second is Ro.Go.Pa.G a collective film made with notable directors as Godard and Rosselini. Pasolini's section - Ricotta - featuring Orson Welles is the strongest section by far. In turns touching, blasphamous and hilarious.
Thirdly is Love meetings in which Pasolini - a pleasure to watch on screen, a very handsome man - tours italy interviewing people about, well, love. That is virginity, sex, homosexuality, etc.
All in all three very interesting films and a novel (enough for me to purchase the boxset itself) to boot. A bargain at any reasonable price. I would buy it if I hadn't already.
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