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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Monday, May 31, 2010 - 12:49 pm:   

A fascinating debate:

http://www.refused-classification.com/news/2010/05-30-senate-estimates-salo-and- adult-magazines.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ Refused-Classification+%28Refused-Classification.com%29
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Seanmcd (Seanmcd)
Username: Seanmcd

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 86.159.131.192
Posted on Thursday, June 03, 2010 - 11:10 pm:   

Nothing i've read about SALO has made me want to rush out and buy it or even download it. How is this different from,say,Caligula ?
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 75.4.226.233
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 05:01 am:   

Sean, you should see it - it's not like CALIGULA. CALIGULA was like a historical drama, with porn and extreme violence. Not bad, imho, not to everyone's tastes, sure... but SALO is something else. CALIGULA is graphic and over-the-top melodrama - but SALO is far more penetrating and disturbing, despite being (? - to me, at least) less graphic by far than CALIGULA....
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 11:51 am:   

Sean, it is a punishing experience and rightly notorious but, believe me, 'Salo' is also an unqualified masterpiece. I had the good fortune to see it on Film 4 (I think it was) back when it was a decent channel you had to pay for...

Everything about the production is pure quality, from Pasolini's chillingly detached orchestration of the parade of horrors to the spectacular cinematography and disconcertingly gorgeous Ennio Morricone score. Having watched it I found myself horrified, yes, but also hugely impressed by the director's sheer bravado and the undeniable technical skill on display. As Craig says, it also isn't as exploitationally graphic as its reputation may suggest, many of the horrors being suggested - which only makes what we do see and imagine all the more harrowing (and we see plenty).

'Caligula' may be a guilty pleasure for Malcolm McDowell's unforgettable performance, the sumptuous production design and OTT nature of the imagery but 'Salo' imho is one of the genuinely great works of Italian cinema - and you know how much I love Italian cinema. Indeed the film may be the single greatest statement on man's inhumanity to man that cinema has yet produced.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.166.117.210
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:00 pm:   

Is there an uncut version of this avilable anywhere? I saw it years ago, on grainy third or fourth generation VHS, and could barely make out what was going on. It certainly had a disturbing quality, but I'd really like to see a nice print to examine the renowned film technique and cinematography. The version I saw looked like a home movie the quality was so bad...
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Seanmcd (Seanmcd)
Username: Seanmcd

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 86.159.131.192
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:18 pm:   

Stevie two things mentioned above will perhaps make me give this a shot. Ennio Morricone and you saying it makes a 'statement'. Good enough for me.

Zed, i think the copy i looked at in HMV was the full uncut version. And full uncut price too!
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.166.117.210
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:29 pm:   

Apparently the R2 edition has the scalping scene censored, despite claiming to be fully restored and uncut.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:30 pm:   

Has anyone here read the source novel by the Marquis de Sade, or any of his works?

I saw a complete set of all his writings a few months back and was sorely tempted but the price they were asking was ridiculous.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:32 pm:   

I wonder which version I saw? It was introduced by Mark Kermode a few years back.
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Mick Curtis (Mick)
Username: Mick

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 194.106.220.19
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:33 pm:   

I believe the Criterion edition is uncut; not sure whether it's still available or not.
I have the Criterion laserdisc version, but haven't watched it in years.
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Seanmcd (Seanmcd)
Username: Seanmcd

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 86.159.131.192
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:33 pm:   

Stevie, there's a good horror story in there. 'The man who hunted de Sade'. Lol!
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.235.168
Posted on Friday, June 04, 2010 - 06:18 pm:   

I have seen it only once, in a local little cinema, and I'm afraid I was bored stiff. Practically the only things I remember today are people eating shit, a character who has his eyes stabbed out and fully grown men pretending to be boys, boy scout uniforms and all. Possibly my thoughts were elsewhere. Doubtless I was still under the spell of Solondz's Happiness which I'd seen mere days before.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.96.240.106
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 02:14 am:   

ha! Hubert, you echo my own memories of the film. I must add, also, that me and the mate who watched it on VHS got a bit bored too and fast-forwarded to the grungy bits. We were only 17, though, so I'm sure we can be forgiven.
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Zed (Gary_mc)
Username: Gary_mc

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 81.96.240.106
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 02:15 am:   

Happiness is a bit of a jaw-dropper, isn't it? I was literally amazed by the film - which is no mean feat.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.235.168
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 08:57 am:   

I remember it well, especially the scenes involving the troubled psychiatrist and his family. People were stunned by the infamous father-son conversation, which must have been tough to film. Dialogue and acting were magnificent throughout; with all the subtext involved some of the scenes felt strangely familiar. A masterpiece.

With Salo I've always had the feeling that people profess to like it because it is so controversial. Nobody wants to be considered a prude.
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Craig (Craig)
Username: Craig

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 75.4.233.241
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 04:32 pm:   

Todd Solodnz is a unique director, not to everyone's liking. But I admire his sheer in-your-face, anti-establishment creativity. STORYTELLING is two stories in one, but bizarrely unbalanced: the first is 30 minutes, the second an hour - why? No real reason, just like there seems to be no real reason why (long before I'M NOT THERE) he had wildly different actors playing the same role in PALINDROMES. His movies defy traditional descriptions, even satisfactions, but resonate and provoke the viewer nevertheless. And are funny, too, in the bleakest, blackest of ways.... He's never been as good as he was in WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE, but he always come close.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 05:13 pm:   

'Happiness' is an awesome movie. I remember the effect it had on the cinema audience when I first saw it - a mixture of elation and profound shock at its sheer audacity. I believe a sequel has just been released, can't remember the name. Anyone heard any reports on it?

Haven't seen 'Welcome To The Dollhouse', Craig, but keep looking out for it.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.21.235.168
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 06:45 pm:   

Palindromes is possibly the weirdest film I've ever seen. Couldn't make head or tail of it. I don't think I've seen other Solondz movies, but I'm always prepared to be amazed.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 82.17.252.126
Posted on Saturday, June 05, 2010 - 07:04 pm:   

The 'Happiness' sequel is called 'Life During Wartime' (like the Talking Heads reference). It's described as "A Dark Comedy of Sexual Obsession" and stars; Ally Sheedy, Renee Taylor, Paul Reubens, Chane't Johnson, Ciaran Hinds, Shirley Henderson, Michael Lerner, Michael Kenneth Williams, Rich Pecci, Charlotte Rampling, Allison Janney and Chris Marquette. Gotta be worth a look...
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.141.208.154
Posted on Sunday, June 06, 2010 - 11:34 am:   

I watched documentary in a planetarium yesterday and think domed screens/lying back is the screen shape of the future. It was like being in the holodeck, utterly magical.
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Tony (Tony)
Username: Tony

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 86.141.208.154
Posted on Sunday, June 06, 2010 - 11:35 am:   

And frightening - for the first time watching a film I felt I could step out of my seat and enter it. The scale and intimacy of the images was almost too much. It was great.
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Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey)
Username: Ramsey

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 195.93.21.74
Posted on Monday, June 07, 2010 - 03:34 pm:   

"With Salo I've always had the feeling that people profess to like it because it is so controversial. Nobody wants to be considered a prude."

Well, I admire it for its rigorousness and the way it takes to their logical conclusion the celebratory elements of Pasolini's earlier trilogy. The first time I saw it (having recently read Sade's novel), I found it almost too restrained, but on subsequent viewings I've grown to find it increasingly disturbing - close to impossible to take.

The BFI version is not only unensored but actually slightly more complete than the Criterion:

http://www.dvdcompare.net/comparisons/film.php?fid=2412

The Criterion transfer is finer, however, and the sumptuous colours (for me anyway) make the whole thing that much more distressing.
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Hubert (Hubert)
Username: Hubert

Registered: 03-2008
Posted From: 78.22.231.205
Posted on Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 03:24 pm:   

Well, maybe I should see more of Pasolini's work before I open my big mouth. The little I have seen of it I found slow to the point of tediousness and even a trifle awkward in places. Last year I saw a fragment from Medea which I really liked, so maybe I should give him another chance. In my mind he's not at all in the same league as Visconti, Bertolucci and Felini, though.
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Stevie Walsh (Stephenw)
Username: Stephenw

Registered: 03-2009
Posted From: 194.32.31.1
Posted on Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 05:01 pm:   

I agree with Ramsey, Hubert.

The film impresses by its sheer single bloody-mindedness of vision and disquieting technical skill. Pasolini was flagellating himself and the world while making this and it should come as no surprise that he was to be murdered by a (in my view) crazed fan soon after. It's an astonishing piece of cinema imho.

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