522 Red Desert

Discuss releases by Criterion and the films on them. Threads may contain spoilers!
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
Matango
Joined: Mon Aug 01, 2005 1:19 am
Location: Hong Kong

Re: 522 Red Desert

#101 Post by Matango » Mon Jun 07, 2010 5:39 am

domino harvey wrote: The Beaver has a proficiency for making screencaps that utterly fail to capture the film under discussion (mostly because they rarely watch the whole thing, me suspects)
I haven't checked recently but I noticed a while back (couple of years or so) that Beaver caps very often seemed to come from the very beginning of chapters.

User avatar
JAP
Joined: Mon May 12, 2008 8:17 am
Location: 39ºN,8ºW
Contact:

Re: 522 Red Desert

#102 Post by JAP » Mon Jun 07, 2010 5:03 pm

Maybe it's common knowledge around here but the 'Notes on Some Limits of Technicolor: The Antonioni Case' article that Ovader mentioned (and linked) some posts above is really interesting.

User avatar
Finch
Joined: Mon Jul 07, 2008 5:09 pm
Location: Edinburgh, UK

Re: 522 Red Desert

#103 Post by Finch » Mon Jun 07, 2010 6:11 pm

TMDaines wrote:The story of Criterion on Blu-ray continues to be underwhelming transfers.
I don't know what your hangup with CC is, my friend. Stagecoach looks as good as can be with the available negatives, Days of Heaven is sublime in 1080p, Yojimbo can be argued to tie with City Girl for the best high def presentation of the year, Repulsion looks mighty nice and so does the recent Walkabout transfer. Even their early Blus like Wages are aesthetically tremendously pleasing. You make it sound as if the top-notch Blu from Crit is the exception.

User avatar
Ovader
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:56 am
Location: Canada

Re: 522 Red Desert

#104 Post by Ovader » Mon Jun 07, 2010 10:52 pm

JAP wrote:Maybe it's common knowledge around here but the 'Notes on Some Limits of Technicolor: The Antonioni Case' article that Ovader mentioned (and linked) some posts above is really interesting.
I was in contact with Mr. Pomerance to see if he can offer some insight into this issue and he gave permission to share some of his thoughts after sending him the link to the Beaver caps:
I can easily enough see the color balancing extremities that have been reached in the division between companies, but nobody has any privileged information about what Antonioni wanted. One would need to have the original matrices that were produced, shot by shot or scene by scene, for him at Technicolor Roma and would probably have to have some of the experts at Technicolor now (Thompson) actually print from these; Antonioni had Eastmancolor prints struck from the Technicolor matrices. The fourth images look most "authentic" to me in terms of the way they reproduce M.V., but again, what looks right to me is irrelevant. His "intentions" for the film were specifically that he create the color, and he used a number of washable paints from Tintal (again in Rome) in order that roads, walls, terrain could be painted to his specifications. The issue beyond that, however, is what any such surface would look like in a particular color process. What I can tell you won't help much, and that is that a tremendous amount of work was done by Technicolor for some sequences to get the matrices that he wanted, which means, the matrices were struck again and again and again until they were satisfactory---something that didn't normally have to be done for filmmakers. There is one more little clue, and to work on it I'd have to see one particular scene in the film. The BFI is not available to me in Canada, but the Criterion will be here June 22 and I'll take a look at it then.

You understand that it's eminently possible that **none** of the available reproductions now actually give the color as Antonioni initially wanted or had it; indeed, possibly what he originally had isn't even what he "wanted." We cannot get inside his head. Further, we don't have the print as it was in 1964 or even as it was for the 1990s restoration. One thing I can say--- looking through the four or five versions of the various scenes in photographic stills on that web page you sent me I was able to see that in every single case there was a color cast to the image. One company had it a little red, the other a little blue, a third a little yellow, etc. But it's possible Antonioni wanted casts in his scenes, and we cannot know. There are no memos or notes about this, to my knowledge.

User avatar
ellipsis7
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 1:56 pm
Location: Dublin

Re: 522 Red Desert

#105 Post by ellipsis7 » Tue Jun 08, 2010 3:02 am

From that piece by Pomerance...
Even as astute a cinephile as Alfred Hitchcock found the colour techniques profoundly stunning, even inexplicable, but unlike Crowther, he knew exactly what he was loving to look at. Peggy Robertson, his assistant, reports that “Red Desert was the first time that he’d seen white on white with no shadows at all, looking beautiful” (15).

He had her write to Giulio Ascarelli of Universal Films in Rome early in April 1965:

“We have just screened Il deserto Rosso, would you please let us know if Technicolor desaturated the film [one could accomplish this, for example, by pre-flashing the film before shooting—MP]. Also we would like any information that you can get regarding types of filters used, etc. One of the credits on this picture reads: “I colori ‘TINTAL’ sono stati forniti dal COLORIFICIO ITALIANO MAX MEYER” I think the translation of this credit is: “The colors ‘TINTAL’ were provided by MAX MEYER ITALIAN COLOR INDUSTRY” What exactly is “TINTAL”? Did the MAX MEYER Company supply the prints for the sets or did they work in conjunction with Mr. Antonioni and Mr. [Carlo] di Palma to design the colors of the sets, or what? (16)


To which Ascarelli immediately replied:

Technicolor did not actually desaturate the film but made a great number of matrices to obtain the effects requested by Antonioni. Antonioni’s aim was to have a dominant grey colour, or should I say colours as soft as possible with the dominating grey tone. I understand that in shooting Antonioni avoided bright colours as much as possible and actually went as far as painting a street in order to get the desired colour effect.

Naturally Technicolor worked very closely with Antonioni. In the printing were not used any special effects or devices. MAX MEYER is a colour manufacturer in Italy. TINTAL is the trade-mark name of a washable colour used particularly for painting walls and it is similar to “Ducotone”. MAX MEYER Company supplied to Antonioni such kind of colours to obtain in filming the effects he wanted. (17)


The Tintal colours were durable but washable tints used by art director Piero Poletto at Antonioni’s direction for painting walls, streets, even a fruit vendor’s fruit, a black house in a swamp, and other objects and surfaces to be photographed for the film. The colours had to be washable so that after a day’s work, the location could be restored to its original colours. Ascarelli, by the way, is clearly wrong in his supposition that Antonioni utterly eschewed bright colours; occasionally, as in the factory and on the oil rig, he rather wallowed in playing with them.

As to the multiple matrices, Ascarelli is informing Robertson that Technicolor Rome went to extraordinary troubles to get the exact matrices that, when dyed, would make for the print Antonioni needed

User avatar
Matango
Joined: Mon Aug 01, 2005 1:19 am
Location: Hong Kong

Re: 522 Red Desert

#106 Post by Matango » Tue Jun 08, 2010 4:03 am

Is there a prize for the thread most guaranteed to suck all enjoyment out of watching a film?

User avatar
Matango
Joined: Mon Aug 01, 2005 1:19 am
Location: Hong Kong

Re: 522 Red Desert

#107 Post by Matango » Tue Jun 08, 2010 4:24 am

No, I am not a complete fool (thanks for asking) I just wonder how many people here are now going to be able to sit down with any BRD or SD edition of this film and enjoy watching it for what it is, without wondering if they've got the perfect version.

User avatar
ellipsis7
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 1:56 pm
Location: Dublin

Re: 522 Red Desert

#108 Post by ellipsis7 » Tue Jun 08, 2010 5:45 am

The DP Carlo Di Palma describes the shoot, and uses of lenses and colour...
The colour could not be treated in a conventional way. Antonioni had precise and rigorous ideas. First of all the grey fog as the basis of almost all sequences of the movie presented me with problems, not inconsiderable. If you start a scene with fog you can't expect to have it always. The use of artificial fog forced me to change filters. The artificial fog would make me take on blue and filtering for theblue environment would produce red faces. Then where I used blue light, to then change setting to the next frame for the arrival of real fog. This happened many times a day. We couldn't turn with the sun, even on an area of shadow because we had to be linked to previous grey. Everybody knows that the reflections of the sky make blue shadows. Each day had surprises. The street shop of Giuliana (exterior) was one of the harder in this respect. There was also the coarse grain of interior and exterior - except for some shots filmed in live studio, which had to be all true. In winter, the fog is going and the grounds are constantly changing, altering the color temperature, varying the light. I should vary continuously the inner light to maintain balance. I have always preferred the solution to vary the Interior against the use of gelatine on the windows for not having to be too low with the external light. Therefore: use of blue light on the inside and outside entrusted only to ambient light with the difficulties of course that I have already outlined. Let us not forget that we shot in winter and many times in low light. There was also the problem of objects at long focal length and the need to take control of the transition from shots with very saturated color to shots shooting with normal objects. So the use of continuous focal gradation. Of course certain effects of long focal length required by the story remained. Sometimes I had to balance recovering. Other times, as in the case of the black house at to Medicina, Antonioni asked for the misty tone of black object with the wonderful effect that you see. While in the scene with the fishmonger's van I had gradated on the passage because of Antonioni was not interested in the colour value, or he rather wanted initial uniformity and then the sweet arrival to shots on the lawn of the worker’s house, with natural and direct colour.

User avatar
MichaelB
Joined: Fri Aug 11, 2006 6:20 pm
Location: Worthing
Contact:

Re: 522 Red Desert

#109 Post by MichaelB » Tue Jun 08, 2010 6:32 am

For what it's worth, only three people can have a truly authoritative idea of what was intended - Antonioni, Carlo di Palma, and the original colour timer. Only the last of these is still alive, and he's now blind - which means that it's now impossible to create a transfer that anyone can legitimately claim to be absolutely definitive. Guesswork is unavoidable at some stage, although in the case of both the BFI and Criterion releases it's of the most highly educated kind.

What's interesting is that the BFI and Criterion worked from exactly the same HD source (a best-light telecine created at Technicolor in Rome in 2008, sourced from the original negative), and each used more or less identical methods when grading and restoring the film - in both cases, a 35mm print was used for reference, with the BFI's coming from its own archive, and Criterion borrowing one from MOMA. I suspect that if both companies had used the same print as reference, the results would be a lot harder to distinguish.

User avatar
ellipsis7
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 1:56 pm
Location: Dublin

Re: 522 Red Desert

#110 Post by ellipsis7 » Tue Jun 08, 2010 7:06 am

The MOMA print was sourced so...
1964. Italy/France. 35mm print, color, sound, 117 min. Acquired from Mediaset S.p.A.
That would be the most recent resto (c. 2001) by Mediaset/Cinema Forever & others, which had some input from Di Palma (d. 2004), who was still alive, but did not supervise the restoration itself... John Francis Lane says this in his Guardian obit of Di Palma...
The film was shot at locations around Ravenna, where, that winter, there was often unwanted sunshine, and Di Palma had to explain to Antonioni that the artificial fog he had chosen played havoc with the colours of the interiors. Visiting the set, I found Di Palma engaged with technicians in painting the grass yellow. "Michelangelo loathes the greens," he explained.
Intriguingly the BFI print from their archive probably dates to an earlier incarnation, before the Cinema Forever restoration...

User avatar
MichaelB
Joined: Fri Aug 11, 2006 6:20 pm
Location: Worthing
Contact:

Re: 522 Red Desert

#111 Post by MichaelB » Tue Jun 08, 2010 7:22 am

ellipsis7 wrote:Intriguingly the BFI print from their archive probably dates to an earlier incarnation, before the Cinema Forever restoration...
The print that was used for reference was acquired in 2003, though of course that's no indication of when it was actually struck.

User avatar
cdnchris
Site Admin
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 2:45 pm
Location: Washington
Contact:

Re: 522 Red Desert

#112 Post by cdnchris » Sat Jun 19, 2010 11:53 am


User avatar
Noiretirc
Joined: Tue Dec 09, 2008 6:04 pm
Location: VanIsle
Contact:

Re: 522 Red Desert

#113 Post by Noiretirc » Sun Jun 20, 2010 12:42 am

So, um, I adore both L'avventura and Blowup, and I came to this thread to find opinions about Red Desert, ie The Film itself, vice bitrate, tv size, penis size, HD sources, reference prints, colour debates, focal gradation, focal length, balance recovering, penis size, natural colour, direct colour, tintal colours, multiple matrices, penis size, Beaver caps, Vistavision, Technicolour, Technirama, Super Technirame, 1.50 aperture, Eastman positive prints, 35mm reductions, penis size, fine grain, matted to 1.66 or 1.85, etc etc etc. Not that there's anything wrong with all of these things.

But what about the Fuckin Film? :P

Edit: The above tirade is slightly unfair. Page 2 has some opinions on the actual film, thanks.

User avatar
HistoryProf
Joined: Mon Mar 13, 2006 3:48 am
Location: KCK

Re: 522 Red Desert

#114 Post by HistoryProf » Sun Jun 20, 2010 2:20 am

swo17 wrote:Another comparison:

Criterion
Image

BFI
Image
I guess i'm crazy, because to me the Criterion is clearly superior, and the BFI caps at beaver and elsewhere look sickly with the greenish hue. As far as I'm concerned, BFI mucked it up and Criterion did it right. :shrugs:
Jeff wrote:
TMDaines wrote:The story of Criterion on Blu-ray continues to be underwhelming transfers.
My Blu-rays of Repulsion, Last Year at Marienbad, Pierrot le Fou, Days of Heaven, Bigger Than Life, and Vivre Sa Vie beg to differ with you.
As do my blu-rays of Walkabout, M, The Third Man, Stagecoach, Revanche, Lola Montes, and Ride With The Devil. In short, that is a patently ludicrous comment.
cdnchris wrote:Blu-ray
as always, thanks for the great work chris - you are the single most consistent and helpful reviewer on the internets. I've grown increasingly excited to pick this up on blu and your review has cemented that...i now NEED to own this. It looks fantastic.

User avatar
CrazedCollector
Joined: Sat May 29, 2010 1:31 am

Re: 522 Red Desert

#115 Post by CrazedCollector » Sun Jun 20, 2010 3:04 am

From first seeing the divide between the BFI and Criterion screencaps on Beaver to reading about the technical work that went into the film's process and its transfers, I'm decided: come late-July, I'm buying both. This is an AB comparison too fun to leave at the screencap level!

User avatar
Particle Zoo
Joined: Thu May 15, 2008 12:01 pm
Location: South of England

Re: 522 Red Desert

#116 Post by Particle Zoo » Sun Jun 20, 2010 4:31 am

I’ve watched the Criterion Blu Ray of ‘Red Desert’ and beyond the observation that its colours are slightly warmer than the BFI, I’m going to leave the onerous task of print comparison to people who might know what they are talking about. All I will say on the subject is that we are lucky to live in an age where we can get such a great film in at least three different English friendly editions. I’ve now triple dipped on it, (Madman DVD, BFI and Criterion Blus), and I fully intend to keep all three. The Madman has a different commentary, (Rolando Caputo), whilst not quite as good as David Forgacs on the other two, its well worth a listen. The BFI has sub titles on it’s commentary, a great feature that Criterion hasn’t ported over. The Criterion of course has the early short films, making the aforementioned triple dip a lot easier to justify to myself.

The other obvious difference is the subtitles, I don’t speak Italian, but the Criterion made certain narrative subtleties clearer to me. And it makes me realise how much I’m at the mercy of translators good and bad, as a frequent viewer of films in languages other than my own. Are the subs better on the Criterion than the BFI? I don’t know, but again, I’m glad to have both.

What I can say with certainty is that the Criterion transfer is a beautiful thing to behold. Viewing it through my projector, it had, at times, an almost 3D quality in it’s depth and with a good bottle of pinot noir, made for a great Saturday night. It is as though, in the words of Giuliana in the dream sequence, ‘everything is singing.’

And for me, this film is one the most profound experiences that I have ever encountered in any art form. It hasn’t dated at all, Antonioni’s concerns a year before my birth remain my own in my forty fourth year. Orwell said in ‘1984’, ‘freedom is the ability to state: two plus two equals four.’ But Giuliana’s son demonstrates to her that ‘one plus one equals one.’
Watching this film again after immersing myself in the Brakhage box I found an affinity in the work of these two visual poets. Both of them challenge the viewer to revisit the presumed familiar with a different gaze. (Even the act of seeing itself is ’presumed familiar’ by most people, most of the time). Neither artist insists that you see ‘this’ specifically, but rather opens up the possibility of seeing more in any given situation. This is most explicitly demonstrated in the telephoto lens shots that blur the landscape into blocks, quoting the technique of abstract painting. Here the scenery is aesthetically pleasing, whilst simultaneously suggesting our alienation from the natural world. It could also be a commentary on Giuliana’s state of mind. It addition it suggests that this crying pool that we call reality is always subject to change, because the lens through which we view it is our emotions. There’s always so many things going on, Antonioni’s mis en scene is as densely packed with possible meanings as a paragraph of Burroughs’s prose.

There’s this haunting dream like quality that infuses the film with a beautiful melancholy, ships sail by seen through improbable windows. Corrado and Giuliana try to make a meaningful connection but can’t, (I’ve had that dream, both asleep and wide awake). Ugo and his friends are slowly engulfed by a literal and metaphysical fog. Giuliana says: ‘I can’t look at the sea too long or I lose interest in what’s going on on land.’

If ever a film demanded a hi def presentation on the home video format, it’s Red Desert and I will watch both the Criterion and the BFI repeatedly, because to my mind, it still shows us where we are, artistically, socially and politically. It is the barometer of the age of ambivalence and paradox.

User avatar
jsteffe
Joined: Sat Mar 31, 2007 9:00 am
Location: Atlanta, GA

Re: 522 Red Desert

#117 Post by jsteffe » Sat Jun 26, 2010 4:49 pm

The new Criterion Blu-ray looks lovely, apart from some minor edge enhancement that I think I spotted at the beginning. Watching it on its own without comparing it to the BFI, the color balance looks great. As usual with HD, the color is rentered with more subtle gradations than on standard DVD.

But I think the biggest difference with a film like this is that the improved definition gives you a more immersive and emotionally engaging experience. This time I caught many more subtleties in Monica Vitti's facial expressions, especially in her eyes. The same is true of other actors--even the orgy in the shack was more convincing this time around because I could better make out the eye play between the various participants. Makes me sad for anyone who would watch a film like this on their iPhone or laptop and think that they've "seen" the film.

User avatar
jsteffe
Joined: Sat Mar 31, 2007 9:00 am
Location: Atlanta, GA

Re: 522 Red Desert

#118 Post by jsteffe » Sat Jun 26, 2010 9:19 pm

david hare wrote:I just hope the Criterion Blu gives you the same striking distinction between matt and gloss painted finishes, starting with Monica in the factory sequence. The use of gloss finishes on industrial elements really brings them to life, compared tgo the matt blues and other primaries which become like Mondrian or Matisse-like blocks of expression within the frame during scenes of Monica's emotional implosions.
That's something I hadn't thought of before, but it seems right. On a barely conscious level I did pick up on something like that while watching the film today. I'll have to go back and look at it again, possibly with the Forgacs commentary.

User avatar
ellipsis7
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 1:56 pm
Location: Dublin

Re: 522 Red Desert

#119 Post by ellipsis7 » Sun Jun 27, 2010 3:33 am

That's a good point, David... Eros and the environment are also supposed to be sick, hence the cool pallid poisoned and fetid greys of the BFI, against the warmer and more comforting grey tones of the CC...

User avatar
Murdoch
Joined: Sun Apr 20, 2008 11:59 pm
Location: Upstate NY

Re: 522 Red Desert

#120 Post by Murdoch » Wed Jul 21, 2010 4:47 pm

Watched this last night and while at first I was more bemused than I have been with the other Antonioni films I've seen, after letting my feelings settle over night I find that it conveys a much deeper sorrow than his previous Vitti collaborations, and conveys the threat of modernity much better - Giuliana's accident suggests the individual being an impediment to progress, that as technology has progressed the individual has become more "useless" in society and is simply in the way. It's a much more internal film, as other posters expressed, than L'eclisse or L'avventura which felt as if the Vitti character was a spectator almost as much as the viewer. She seemed to exist peripheral to what was happening: the stock exchange in L'eclisse where she casually gazes on at the chaos, walking in on the affair between the young artist and her married friend in L'avventura and the way neither seems to really notice her presence despite speaking to her. Red Desert shows Antonioni's viewer the anguish that had been brewing within Vitti's psyche, her character seems to be a collective of all the anxiety that she has experienced before. Placing her within the cold and sterile industrial landscape, she is in a regular state of discomfort and nervousness - especially in the beginning scene where she is surrounded by machinery when she meets Harris, she wanders anxiously and the sudden release of steam gives her such fright she scurries away. Even the romantic entanglement she falls into is simply another source of distress by the time it comes to its tragic conclusion. The more I think about this film the more utterly devastating a character study it is. The narrated story told to the son in particular, which threw me off at first, is the most internal aspect of the film, and despite the bright visuals it conveys the most sorrowful moments of the film. When the curious ship appears only to quickly sail off, as if it's discovered the little girl and deemed her unsatisfactory for whatever it came for, or worse yet that the boat drifts purposelessly as Giuliana does, forever dissatisfied with what it encounters. The exchange with the sailor creates a sense of doom finalized for Giuliana, that she has only become more alienated from those around her, so much so that she is a foreigner in her own home

The many shots situated behind Vitti's head reinforce the internal nature of the film, trying to place the viewer in the perspective of Giuliana and emphasizing her anonymity among her surroundings by showing the back of her head in the frame instead of a simple point-of-view shot. I've become so used to actors' faces being the focal point on their body for the camera that the abundance of times Vitti is shown from behind is an unsettling yet profound visual.

This film won't leave my thoughts and I find myself feeling great pity for Giuliana, one of the most multi-dimensional characters I've seen.

nolanoe
Joined: Fri Jan 08, 2010 10:25 am

Re: 522 Red Desert

#121 Post by nolanoe » Fri Jul 23, 2010 4:22 pm

This might be my favorite Antonioni. So far, it was between ZABRISKIE POINT and L'ECLISSE, but having seen RED DESERT some months ago, I think I like it best.

The film is a lot better/makes much more sense once you realize that it might just be set on the planet mars. :wink:
The name, the theme of alienation, the landscape and the factories... I know that it is a stretch, but try to see it as a low budget sci-fi film, much as ALPHAVILLE is (car = Spaceship there / ship = spaceship here). Even if it wasn't intended, it makes nice speculation, and certainly paints Monica Vitti's character's emotions in a different light.

As for the color issues, there is one crucial scene: the flames that come from the fumes in the beginning are meant to be a stark yellow instead of red or orange. I don't have the Criterion, but if somebody got both and would do screengrabs, this would settle this argument very quickly. :)
With the information, I must say I also strongly tend to the BFI. The CRITERION looks gorgeous though, and I might buy both. Yes, I love the film that much!!

EDIT: Murdoch - where is your avatar from?

User avatar
Matt
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 12:58 pm

Re: 522 Red Desert

#122 Post by Matt » Fri Jul 23, 2010 4:55 pm

nolanoe wrote:As for the color issues, there is one crucial scene: the flames that come from the fumes in the beginning are meant to be a stark yellow instead of red or orange. I don't have the Criterion, but if somebody got both and would do screengrabs, this would settle this argument very quickly.
Because there are some color fluctuations in the first few minutes of the film, I posted 6 captures of the flames from the Criterion DVD here.
Personally, I think the Criterion BD of the film looks great. Very rich colors, but natural skin tones. And for the first time, to my eyes, Richard Harris' hair color looks almost like something that occurs naturally. Not that I'm denigrating the BFI here - I haven't seen it.

nolanoe
Joined: Fri Jan 08, 2010 10:25 am

Re: 522 Red Desert

#123 Post by nolanoe » Sun Jul 25, 2010 6:30 am

Yeah, you mustn't forget that Antonioni wanted to use the color palette to show the world through the characters eyes - very un-natural and artificial. Now, we could ask 10 people which one they find more unnatural, and 10 people would say 10 different things. The only thing we can go by in terms of what is correct in our speculation, we have the yellow flame, the knowledge that Antonioni wanted the colors to look artificial and the old advertisement photos. Those lean more towards the BFI, yet the Criterion also looks gorgeous in its own right... so I'll try to grab the Criterion as well and enjoy the double experience.

Also Matt, your link doesn't work. It shows me a forum-icon.

EDIT: OK, a quick search made me find your post and I must say, this is much more orange/reddish than yellow. So this does that: BFI is closer indeed.

I will get the Criterion though, because it looks great as well and is a nice addition to the BFI.

User avatar
dad1153
Joined: Thu Apr 16, 2009 10:32 am
Location: New York, NY

Re: 522 Red Desert

#124 Post by dad1153 » Tue Jul 27, 2010 5:22 pm

Saw "Red Desert" on Blu-ray over the weekend. My third Antonioni (after "Blow Up" and "The Passenger") and I'll freely confess that, after a single viewing, I'm so thrown off from seeing it that I don't have a coherent opinion yet. It'd be easy to say it's Antonioni being Antonioni (i.e. same lengthy shots and slow-burn pace as earlier and latter films of his) but, within the amazing visuals it features, the characters and story left me puzzled more than anything. The one movie this reminds me of more than any other is Roeg's "The Man Who Fell To Earth" in how alien and separated from the surroundings (which are more alien-looking in Antonioni's flick) the lead character is. The electronic-heavy music is all the excuse anyone needs that wants to think Giuliana is an alien being having its internal wiring short-circuited by what men are doing to their own planet ("Red Desert" a sci-fi movie? :roll: ). Guess what threw me off and didn't see coming was the neurosis of Monica Vitti being the centerpiece of the movie. I knew Vitti was in "Red Desert" but didn't expect her character's mind (or the back of it that Antonioni keeps going back to in shot after shot) and the way she reacts to her surroundings to be front and center throughout. Richard Harris (who looks/sounds like Devon from "Knight Rider" in his dubbed Italian voice) is pretty bland and nonchalant but, within Antonioni's cast of other bland human characters (except for the horny bald husband in the orgy), Harris and Vitti stand out. Picture on Blu-ray isn't the sharpest or cleanest transfer (tons of grainy and undetailed shots) but, as a representation of the director's artistic visual expression of man's ability (or inability in the case of Giuliana) to cope with his man-made ecological disaster, Antonioni's cinematography and production design (the shot of the street/fruit cart painted in grey blew my little mind... it's one thing to read about but seeing it is something else) really shine in high-def. This one needs to be rewatched because on first viewing it has left me bewildered and confused (why do all men Giuliana comes across want to make love to her when she's clearly going mental?). Commentary and bonus features here I come! :(

Panda
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 3:22 pm
Location: New England

Re: 522 Red Desert

#125 Post by Panda » Thu Jul 29, 2010 7:14 pm

I had a freeze-up glitch on the Criterion Blu-Ray at 1:05:55 on the Oppo BDP-83. Anyone else have this problem? I got a replacement disc and it now plays through Giuliana adrift in the fog. Hope there are no other problems.

I do find that the grain works well with the gray canvas Antonioni choose to paint upon.

Post Reply