SALO: A 'review' *SPOILERS, MATURE*
01-22-01, 03:19 PM
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There is no need to repeat the infamous content of Pier Paolo Pasolini's Salo. The reputation of the film precedes it like a stench, murmured by cineastes and exploitation film fans for the more than 25 years since its controversial debut.
What I will attempt here is a somewhat disorganized description of the film's content only in relation to my feelings and thoughts on the issues the film raises. If you are unfamiliar with the film's premise and content, be advised that not only is it upsetting to most right-minded people, but may also 'dull' the experience of watching it if you ever choose to.
Indeed, Salo is one of the most upsetting films I have ever seen. This, despite the fact that I have read detailed breakdowns and discussions of nearly every scene beforehand. I viewed the DVD with a lot of apprehension. A few years ago, a cable channel ran a program about the history of violence in cinema. They included about 2 15-second clips from Salo. Those were enough to give me one of the worst nightmares of my life.
Violence, degradation, rape, sodomy, torture--these things are intrinsically upsetting, unless cinema makes them palatable and pleasurable to the viewer. Salo makes no such attempt. Pound for pound, you have likely seen much worse violence on screen in your movie-watching life. The reason Salo is so affecting, like A Clockwork Orange, is not because of the onscreen violence (and there is a lot more of it in Salo then in Clockwork), but rather HOW it is presented.
Salo is like watching a documentary about the degradation of human beings. Fascist rule allows no special attention to the sufferings of people under its system. The point of view of the film, and Pasolini's unblinking camera, is that of the Sadist. Before even its shocking conclusion, the viewer is implicated in looking at the victims. Often the most horrific happenings are framed from a far-off vantage point, like an architecturalist's eye. The lighting is matter-of-fact, unexceptional--coming from what appear to be natural sources it gives the naked, violated flesh of the young victims a sickly pallor.
Salo is a film about Fascism. Pasolini and his postwar generation grew up with its aftereffects. The terrible abyss of the film's philosophy (or lack of one) is that the 'people,' the youth and commoners, will endure violent rule without protest. The film implicates Italy's, and Europe's, complacency in allowing men to rule violently over other men.
There are two key moments in the film that reviews seldom mention, and give hints to Salo's moral center, if there is one. One comes at the beginning, when a young man is being led away by the armed fascist youth guards to serve in the retinue of the Fascist torturers. His mother runs after him, crying "My Son! My Son! Do not forget your scarf!" Whether there is a veiled symbolism there specific to Italy I do not know--but the moment provoked sadness and anger in me; the Mother runs after her Son, who is consigned to a likely cruel fate, and can think only of her Matriarchal obligation to keep his neck warm--she does not fight the abduction, does not even protest.
The other key moment, and one of the only slivers of light in the film, comes near the end. Here the Fascists, after extracting informant confessions from several of the teenagers in order to spare their lives or procure mercy, track down the same abducted teenage guard from the beginning. He is having sex with the black maid, and according to the rules of the Chateau, must be killed for disobedience, and for practising heterosexual sex without direct permission. He is also partaking in interracial love, which the Fascists cannot be too happy about. The choice of the maid being black is not extraneous on Pasolini's part. This is a symbolic portrayal of the brotherhood of humanity that the Fascists seek to destroy, by pitting one group against another and creating fear. Before shooting him dead, the young, naked guard raises one fist in a defiant salute. For one moment, the Fascists lower their pistols and are given pause. Their power of fear is gone, even in the face of death, but they shoot him dead all the same. This is one idea, that perhaps for a moment, they are unable to extinguish. The black maid is then shot through the head while prostrate, leaning across a chair. I am unsure, in his deliberate framing and design, whether this is supposed to be a reference to a classical work of art with a symbolic allusion.
Other than that, the film through and though has an atmosphere of total dread and hopelessness. The thing I found most poignant and disturbing about it is that Pasolini, like so many Western artists, implicates the total failure of our culture to protect us from evil.
The Fascists are learned men--they reference Nietzche, Baudelaire, the Dadaists. They sing popular songs. They are surrounded by modern art. Classical music accompanies their acts of violence, played on live piano, or on radios. But they are the newest breed of cultured savage, sanctioned by the state.
It is important to note that in the very first scene, the Fascists sign the decree in an office giving them the rule and the power to commit these atrocities. What would have been considered an extraneous detail in a traditional film is given dreadful gravity in Salo. "In the beginning was the Word." Here, the Fascists make themselves G-d. Not only are the victims ordered under penalty of death to not commit any religious speech or act because of Fascism's inherent anti-religiosity, but because they must be considered no less than the givers of life and death itself.
They must also control the body of the people. They must witness and/or participate in all bodily acts. Eating, shitting, and f**king must all be ordained to give the rulers their happiness. The atrocities committed by them are more than horrific cinema, they operate on the metaphorical level.
When the Duke defecates on the floor and orders a young, hysterical, religious girl to eat it, it is his way of asserting his total power over this girl's body. From ingestion to defecation, the only pleasure that the rulers possess is to possess others. The youth are so much as meat. If they do not serve as instruments of violence, they serve as instruments of pleasure--and in the Sado-Fascist world, both are equal.
In the end, of course, they derive the ultimate pleasure from seeing the victims tortured and killed in the courtyard as they view from binoculars. It is spectacle, nothing more. The final horror, besides the event of the destruction of life and limb, is that several of the youth remain to serve under the Fascists. They have been indoctrinated into the life and philosophy of death and power. One of the Fascists fondles the penis of a young observer as they watch the bloodbath in the courtyard below, and says "Now, you are ready." The cycle continues.
I believe that it was a blackly ironic counterpoint, a metaphorically deliberate choice by Pasolini to include as background music to this scene a lesser-known passage from Orff's "Carmina Burana"--the "Veris leta facies (The merry face of spring)" section. The translation of the Latin lyrics is:
The merry face of spring
turns to the world,
sharp winter
now flees, vanquished;
bedecked in various colours
Flora reigns,
the harmony of the woods
praises her in song. Ah!
Lying in Flora's lap
Phoebus once more
smiles, now covered
in many-coloured flowers,
Zephyr breathes nectar-scented breezes.
Let us rush to compete
for love's prize. Ah!
In harp-like tones sings
the sweet nightingale,
with many flowers
the joyous meadows are laughing,
a flock of birds rises up
through the pleasant forests,
the chorus of maidens
already promises a thousand joys. Ah!
I cannot say that I am better person for finally having watched Salo. It left me with a feeling of heavy sadness and desolation. I will never watch the film again (I don't think there is any need) and I will not recommend it to others.
I must admire Pasolini's insane courage, his total lack of fear, in making such an atrocity of a film. I will never know what it means in totality, and will never know if, indeed, it means anything. If you have any belief that film at its highest level can reveal truth about the human race, this is a troubling one to think about. It is designed to be a splinter in the human mind, a scar on the brain. I will have to live with its images and sounds for the rest of my life.
What I will attempt here is a somewhat disorganized description of the film's content only in relation to my feelings and thoughts on the issues the film raises. If you are unfamiliar with the film's premise and content, be advised that not only is it upsetting to most right-minded people, but may also 'dull' the experience of watching it if you ever choose to.
Indeed, Salo is one of the most upsetting films I have ever seen. This, despite the fact that I have read detailed breakdowns and discussions of nearly every scene beforehand. I viewed the DVD with a lot of apprehension. A few years ago, a cable channel ran a program about the history of violence in cinema. They included about 2 15-second clips from Salo. Those were enough to give me one of the worst nightmares of my life.
Violence, degradation, rape, sodomy, torture--these things are intrinsically upsetting, unless cinema makes them palatable and pleasurable to the viewer. Salo makes no such attempt. Pound for pound, you have likely seen much worse violence on screen in your movie-watching life. The reason Salo is so affecting, like A Clockwork Orange, is not because of the onscreen violence (and there is a lot more of it in Salo then in Clockwork), but rather HOW it is presented.
Salo is like watching a documentary about the degradation of human beings. Fascist rule allows no special attention to the sufferings of people under its system. The point of view of the film, and Pasolini's unblinking camera, is that of the Sadist. Before even its shocking conclusion, the viewer is implicated in looking at the victims. Often the most horrific happenings are framed from a far-off vantage point, like an architecturalist's eye. The lighting is matter-of-fact, unexceptional--coming from what appear to be natural sources it gives the naked, violated flesh of the young victims a sickly pallor.
Salo is a film about Fascism. Pasolini and his postwar generation grew up with its aftereffects. The terrible abyss of the film's philosophy (or lack of one) is that the 'people,' the youth and commoners, will endure violent rule without protest. The film implicates Italy's, and Europe's, complacency in allowing men to rule violently over other men.
There are two key moments in the film that reviews seldom mention, and give hints to Salo's moral center, if there is one. One comes at the beginning, when a young man is being led away by the armed fascist youth guards to serve in the retinue of the Fascist torturers. His mother runs after him, crying "My Son! My Son! Do not forget your scarf!" Whether there is a veiled symbolism there specific to Italy I do not know--but the moment provoked sadness and anger in me; the Mother runs after her Son, who is consigned to a likely cruel fate, and can think only of her Matriarchal obligation to keep his neck warm--she does not fight the abduction, does not even protest.
The other key moment, and one of the only slivers of light in the film, comes near the end. Here the Fascists, after extracting informant confessions from several of the teenagers in order to spare their lives or procure mercy, track down the same abducted teenage guard from the beginning. He is having sex with the black maid, and according to the rules of the Chateau, must be killed for disobedience, and for practising heterosexual sex without direct permission. He is also partaking in interracial love, which the Fascists cannot be too happy about. The choice of the maid being black is not extraneous on Pasolini's part. This is a symbolic portrayal of the brotherhood of humanity that the Fascists seek to destroy, by pitting one group against another and creating fear. Before shooting him dead, the young, naked guard raises one fist in a defiant salute. For one moment, the Fascists lower their pistols and are given pause. Their power of fear is gone, even in the face of death, but they shoot him dead all the same. This is one idea, that perhaps for a moment, they are unable to extinguish. The black maid is then shot through the head while prostrate, leaning across a chair. I am unsure, in his deliberate framing and design, whether this is supposed to be a reference to a classical work of art with a symbolic allusion.
Other than that, the film through and though has an atmosphere of total dread and hopelessness. The thing I found most poignant and disturbing about it is that Pasolini, like so many Western artists, implicates the total failure of our culture to protect us from evil.
The Fascists are learned men--they reference Nietzche, Baudelaire, the Dadaists. They sing popular songs. They are surrounded by modern art. Classical music accompanies their acts of violence, played on live piano, or on radios. But they are the newest breed of cultured savage, sanctioned by the state.
It is important to note that in the very first scene, the Fascists sign the decree in an office giving them the rule and the power to commit these atrocities. What would have been considered an extraneous detail in a traditional film is given dreadful gravity in Salo. "In the beginning was the Word." Here, the Fascists make themselves G-d. Not only are the victims ordered under penalty of death to not commit any religious speech or act because of Fascism's inherent anti-religiosity, but because they must be considered no less than the givers of life and death itself.
They must also control the body of the people. They must witness and/or participate in all bodily acts. Eating, shitting, and f**king must all be ordained to give the rulers their happiness. The atrocities committed by them are more than horrific cinema, they operate on the metaphorical level.
When the Duke defecates on the floor and orders a young, hysterical, religious girl to eat it, it is his way of asserting his total power over this girl's body. From ingestion to defecation, the only pleasure that the rulers possess is to possess others. The youth are so much as meat. If they do not serve as instruments of violence, they serve as instruments of pleasure--and in the Sado-Fascist world, both are equal.
In the end, of course, they derive the ultimate pleasure from seeing the victims tortured and killed in the courtyard as they view from binoculars. It is spectacle, nothing more. The final horror, besides the event of the destruction of life and limb, is that several of the youth remain to serve under the Fascists. They have been indoctrinated into the life and philosophy of death and power. One of the Fascists fondles the penis of a young observer as they watch the bloodbath in the courtyard below, and says "Now, you are ready." The cycle continues.
I believe that it was a blackly ironic counterpoint, a metaphorically deliberate choice by Pasolini to include as background music to this scene a lesser-known passage from Orff's "Carmina Burana"--the "Veris leta facies (The merry face of spring)" section. The translation of the Latin lyrics is:
The merry face of spring
turns to the world,
sharp winter
now flees, vanquished;
bedecked in various colours
Flora reigns,
the harmony of the woods
praises her in song. Ah!
Lying in Flora's lap
Phoebus once more
smiles, now covered
in many-coloured flowers,
Zephyr breathes nectar-scented breezes.
Let us rush to compete
for love's prize. Ah!
In harp-like tones sings
the sweet nightingale,
with many flowers
the joyous meadows are laughing,
a flock of birds rises up
through the pleasant forests,
the chorus of maidens
already promises a thousand joys. Ah!
I cannot say that I am better person for finally having watched Salo. It left me with a feeling of heavy sadness and desolation. I will never watch the film again (I don't think there is any need) and I will not recommend it to others.
I must admire Pasolini's insane courage, his total lack of fear, in making such an atrocity of a film. I will never know what it means in totality, and will never know if, indeed, it means anything. If you have any belief that film at its highest level can reveal truth about the human race, this is a troubling one to think about. It is designed to be a splinter in the human mind, a scar on the brain. I will have to live with its images and sounds for the rest of my life.
