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54 DVD REVIEWS 2/10/12 3:26 PM Page 56 And so, while in Le beau Serge the title Identification is certainly more light- character achieves a kind of redemption by Identification hearted than any of Antonioni’s previous being united with his newborn child thanks films. The opening scene—with film director to the backbreaking efforts and, ultimately, of a Woman Niccolò Farra (Tomas Milian) fumbling for sacrifice of the tubercular François, whose Produced by Giorgio Nocella and Antonio his keys, crawling into his apartment to life may have been shortened by his treks Macrì; directed by Michelangelo Antonioni; avoid setting off the burglar alarm (it goes through the snow, in Les cousins there is no screenplay by Antonioni and Gérard Brach, off anyway), struggling to answer his tele- redemption, and certainly no salvation: in collaboration with Tonino Guerra; phone before the answering machine takes Charles must die in order to preserve the cinematography by Carlo Di Palma; over, and confronting a suspicious neighbor nothingness of his cousin’s lifestyle, edited by Michelangelo Antonioni; music who investigates the commotion armed with although we don’t quite know where that by John Foxx; starring Tomas Milian, a pistol—establishes the protagonist’s mid- lifestyle is going to end up as we hear the Daniela Silverio, Christine Boisson, and life crisis with the comic panache of Woody apartment buzzer sounding to end the film. Marcel Bozzuffi. DVD and Blu-ray, color, Allen. Both films are essential Chabrol. But 130 min., with Italian dialogue and English Niccolò, recently divorced, is at an artistic there is no question that Le beau Serge might subtitles, 1982. A Criterion Collection and personal impasse, searching for a be seen more as a necessary step in the release, distributed by Image Entertainment, woman to fill the void in his upcoming dechristianization of the director than as an www.Image-Entertainment.com. movie project and in his private life (shades independent statement in and of itself. Les of 8 1/2!). The first of his new amores, Mavi cousins, on the other hand, brilliantly and With his late-career masterpiece, Identifi- (Daniela Silverio), is a very modern ragazza: cynically paves the way for the many very cation of a Woman, Michelangelo Antonioni, sexually liberated, self-absorbed (a semi- dark, brilliant, and cynical tales that will aged seventy, returned to the themes, style, nude poster of Mavi adorns her bedroom turn up in Chabrol’s oeuvre. I also need to and milieu that gained him worldwide wall), well-educated, aristocratic, impulsive, add that Les cousins, unlike Le beau Serge, prominence in the 1960s. Following a series and a bit androgynous. The erotic scenes offers a quite effective musical score, in this of films produced abroad—including Blow- between Niccolò and Mavi have a riveting case by Paul Misraki, whose cool and mildly Up, Zabriskie Point, Chung Kuo Cina, and intensity, due to their graphic explicitness. jazzy strains perfectly complement the film’s The Passenger—Identification was the director’s Yet, despite engaging in starkly photographed milieu, as does some more unsettling and first film since Red Desert (1964) to take place sex acts (including several masturbatory, rather percussive music that lead us into the in contemporary Italy, among the decadent oral, and anal variations), Mavi refuses to final scene. bourgeoisie, the director’s usual social setting. talk about sex afterward. In addition, after Both of these black-and-white films have Antonioni’s repatriation also produced a each of these steamy couplings, Antonioni benefited here from their Blu-ray transfers, mellowing of style and a loosening of the cuts to images that hint at the emptiness of although I have not seen the original Criterion austere compositions of his earlier work, the Niccolò-Mavi relationship. After their DVDs. Le beau Serge in particular allows us without diminishing its painterly splendor first sexual encounter, Mavi experiences to take in all of the details, whether in the (courtesy of Carlo Di Palma’s cinematography). vaginal pains; simultaneously, the distant, village or in the various outdoor shots, Clearly recognizable as an Antonioni film, understated wail of a police siren subtly sug- brought into sharp definition by the lighting Identification nonetheless indicated a new gests a moral undercutting of the couple’s and camerawork of cinematographer Henri direction in his oeuvre. Although it received libertinism. After their second sex scene (the Decaë. Both releases offer audio commen- a major prize at Cannes and was nominated one featuring anal stimulation), Antonioni taries, if you are inclined to listen to them, for the Palme d’Or, a destructively negative cuts to a painting of St. Peter’s Basilica, as if and the beau Serge Blu-ray disc includes a review in The New York Times (“an excruci- to reestablish the power of the Church and wonderful documentary, directed by Francis atingly empty work”) provoked its U.S. dis- the superego. (In addition, as she reaches Girod in 2004, entitled Claude Chabrol: Mon tributor to shelve the film. So, instead of orgasm, Mavi narcissistically stares at herself premier film, which features Chabrol himself becoming a “comeback” effort, the film- in a nearby mirror.) Finally, during the third and other surviving members of crew and maker’s career ground to a halt. It is there- erotic escapade, after a beautiful shot of the cast, in particular Brialy and Bernadette fore noteworthy that The Criterion Collec- couple having joyous “make-up sex” under Lafont, who plays Serge’s oversexed sister- tion has released this underrated (and a bed sheet, we cut to a row of unfilled in-law. underseen) film. bookshelves in the morning light, an apt There is also a somewhat annoying black-and-white segment from a 1969 French TV program that shows Chabrol revisiting Sardent. I would pick a bone with film critic Terrence Rafferty who, in the booklet accompanying Les cousins, suggests that, after Les cousins, the director would not “recover his form” until the 1968 Les biches, when in fact there are a good half-dozen outstanding films that followed Les cousins, in particular Les bonnes femmes (1960), an absolute masterpiece that desperately needs a decent DVD. I close by noting that chabrol is actually a word in the French language meaning a mixture of wine and broth. To faire chabrol is to drink this concoction directly out of the bowl, an act that we see in one of the direc- tor’s middle-period films, I think Les noces rouges (1973), which was shot near the region where the term originated.—Royal S. Niccolò (Tomas Milian) replaces one girlfriend with another woman, Ida (Christine Boisson), Brown in Antonioni’s Identification of a Woman (1982) (photo courtesy of The Criterion Collection). 56 CINEASTE, Spring 2012 54 DVD REVIEWS 2/10/12 3:26 PM Page 57 commentary on their empty relationship. comparison between a two-dimensional street sign leading to Mavi’s flat; slogans for In addition to his abiding focus on “sick substitute and flesh-and-blood sexuality the Italian Socialist Party and a Communist Eros,” Antonioni has always been a chroni- contains obvious wit, but it is poignantly hammer and sickle scrawled on walls; and cler of social class in postwar Italy’s il boom. recalled later when Niccolò, having lost natural landscapes) or subtle sound effects Here, in 1982, his sharp observations of the Mavi, forlornly pastes a photograph of (the motorboat, police siren, and jarring haute bourgeoisie remain intact, particularly Louise Brooks onto his rain-soaked window. New Age music). in an elegant party scene in which Niccolò’s The issue of representation is brought up After eliding the details of the breakup discomfort is apparent as he meets Mavi’s throughout the film, but representation is with Ida, Antonioni merely cuts to Niccolò vapid, icy, and haughty friends. At one not merely an individual matter; indeed, the entering his apartment (this time he has his point, Niccolò flicks his cigarette ashes into nearly nude photo of Mavi adorns not only key!). As Niccolò looks out his window, we what he mistakes for an ashtray, only to her wall but also an issue of Time devoted to share his point of view: lush trees and vege- learn that it’s actually a pricey bracelet, and “Europe’s Women Today.” Thus, Antonioni tation amid the oppression of the modern that he’s just soiled an expensive embroi- points to the lackluster state of heterosexual megalopolis, and, in particular, a peculiar dered lace tablecloth. ardor in 1982 Europe and the concurrent tree branch he had stared at before. The pre- Sometime after this soirée is the film’s riflusso, the withdrawal from passionate cise meaning of this evocative burl may most meaningful set-piece: a drive and social commitment, as well as the media- escape denotative exactness, but, like so search through dense nighttime fog. Allusions ization and commodification of pervasive many significant objects in the Antonioni imbricate over intertextual references as eroticism. Finally, Mavi, who apparently has canon, its connotations are myriad. Niccolò and Mavi, on their way to a country had a string of lesbian liaisons in her past, Niccolò, however, does not only stare house built on (metaphorical) hollow drifts into another homoerotic pairing. out at that tree; he also looks out through Roman ruins, lose their way in a blanket of Like Sandro in L’Avventura, Niccolò rose-colored glasses and closes his eyes. The whitish-gray haze. Their verbal argument is merely replaces Mavi with another woman, enrapturing images that follow—Niccolò’s as much a product of the vaporous environ- Ida (Christine Boisson), who physically thoughts, I imagine—are so jarringly incon- ment as of their basic class and emotional resembles his lost lover.