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Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom (Pier Paolo Pasolini) 1975
I suppose the film's infamous because of
its depictions of homosexuality, child (they seem to be about 16-20) nudity,
scatology, torture, and the like, but Pasolini's camera rarely show us these
scenes in close-up, so we're able to remain, thankfully,
a bit detached and process what we're seeing intellectually rather than
emotionally. I suppose I was a bit trained by the film's reputation to expect to
see that sort of thing, so I wasn't exceptionally shocked. That's sort of the
point though... throughout the film, we're made to watch atrocities, yet we
continue to watch silently. Even worse, the parade of cruelty grows somewhat
tedious as the film goes on. It makes it a little clearer how something so
horrible as the Holocaust could occur. It becomes apparent that the film itself
is not evil, rather that the film tries to show us something evil (fascism) and
to do so requires some uncomfortable moments.
* * * 1/2 September, 2001 Jeremy Heilman |