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Luchino Visconti

Claudia Cardinale – up for a challenge

1966. Claudia Cardinale, radiant, at an event. Read more.

During the early 1960s, the Italian actresses whose names were on audiences’ lips outside Italy were Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren. They’d broken into Hollywood and in doing so left a gap back home. Into that gap stepped Claudia Cardinale with glorious aplomb.

In 1963, her breakthrough year, she starred in two of the iconic films of the era: Federico Fellini’s 8½ and Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard. It wasn’t long before Hollywood beckoned. After all, Claudia had all the necessary qualifications. As The Guardian observed in its 11 September 2011 edition:

A generation of postwar cinephiles rhapsodised over her earthy voluptuousness, her hourglass figure, her “bedroom eyes”, her cascading brunette tresses. She was the embodiment of postwar European glamour and was packaged as such, on screen and off. It’s almost like she had sexiness thrust upon her.

But there’s more to Claudia Cardinale than meets the eye…

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Claudia Cardinale poses for a portrait

Claudia Cardinale poses for a portrait

1959. Claudia Cardinale, at the outset of her career, poses for a portrait shot. She's up against a wall here – literally rather than metaphorically. There's a Cameraphoto agency stamp on the back of the print as well as a date (21 July 1959).

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Claudia Cardinale as Bianca, a prostitute, in Mauro Bolognini's film La viaccia (The Lovemakers)

Claudia Cardinale, promotional shot for La viaccia

1961. Claudia Cardinale as Bianca, a prostitute, in Mauro Bolognini's film La viaccia (The Lovemakers). The descriptive label on the back of the photo partially obscures a Pierluigi copyright notice. There's also a Cinémonde Archives stamp.

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Claudia Cardinale at a premiere

Claudia Cardinale at a premiere

1966. The premiere is likely of The Professionals in Monte Carlo on 28 November 1966. The print is stamped on the back by Reporters Associés (Paris) and International Magazine Service (Sweden).

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Claudia Cardinale head and shoulders with water drips

Claudia Cardinale

Mid-1960s. It looks like Claudia Cardinale has just got out of a swimming pool. There's nothing on the back of the print to indicate when or where this photo was taken. It has also proved impossible to track down online, hence the vague date.

Claudia Cardinale’s teenage turbulence

Her father, a railway worker, is a Sicilian emigrant to Tunisia. Her mother is French (or, according to some accounts, born in Tunisia to Sicilian emigrants). They make their home in Tunis and that’s where Claudia is born in 1938. She grows up with her three siblings, with French her first language (Tunisia is a French protectorate) but also a smattering of Tunisian Arabic and Sicilian (a different and distinct language from Italian).

Claudia Cardinale publicity shot for Il bell'Antonio
1959. Claudia Cardinale publicity shot by Elda Luxardo & Francesco Alessi for Il bell’Antonio. Read more.

Her first appearance on film is in the 1956 movie Anneaux d’or. Alongside her classmates all dressed in white, she stands on the shore watching a group of young men on a boat waving enthusiastically at them. She follows this up in 1957 with a minor role opposite Omar Sharif in Goha, a French-Tunisian movie nominated for the Palme d’Or at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival. She also starts at university with a view to becoming a primary school teacher but fate intervenes. She remembers:

I was in the crowd at the Most Beautiful Italian Girl in Tunisia contest, watching all the girls onstage. Suddenly a man took me up there and put the ribbon on me! The prize was a trip to the Venice Film Festival. At the time the bikini was not common in Italy, and I arrived in a bikini with a djellaba robe on top. All the paparazzi were photographing me. I was with my mother, very young – we couldn’t understand what was happening! It was all because I had a bikini on. Then they asked me to do cinema and I said no. When I got on the plane home, there was a picture of me in the newspaper, and the headline was ‘The Girl Who Refuses Cinema’.

She does, however, accept a place at the Centro Sperimentale Cinematografico, Italy’s national film school in Rome. But it doesn’t work out. She’s there for little more than a month before, feeling homesick, struggling with the language and disenchanted with the Method approach to acting, she calls it a day. She makes her way back to Tunis, where something truly shocking happens:

One day as I was walking home from school in Tunis a man in a car grabbed me and raped me and I became pregnant. After that my mother and my sister stayed close to me. I gave birth in London, because in those days it would have been a scandal. We pretended that my son was my little brother. I didn’t want to become an actress; I did it so I could be independent.

1961. Claudia Cardinale. Photo by Angelo Frontoni.

Meanwhile, for the Italian cinema world, out of sight has not meant out of mind. Stories continue to appear in magazines about the girl who rejected stardom to be with her family. Offers continue to roll in. Finally, depressed and at her wits’ end, she signs a long-term contract with Vides Films, a production company set up by Franco Cristaldi. It is he who sends her to London to keep her pregnancy away from the prying eyes of the Italian press. Her son Patrick is then placed in the care of nuns in Italy. When he gets to four and a half, he’s transferred to Tunis to be looked after by Claudia’s parents. The story is that he’s Claudia’s little brother.

The Vides contract turns out to be a double-edged sword. It gets Claudia out of her predicament and will be the making of her professionally, but financially it will prove to be a disaster, she later tells Variety.

Well, Cristaldi was the best producer in Europe and thanks to him I made lots of great movies. But the problem was that I was paid a monthly salary; I wasn’t paid per movie. I was just an employee, like an office worker. So when that contract ended I didn’t have a dime in the bank.

Cristaldi’s interest in Claudia turns out to be not just professional. He also becomes romantically involved, just as Carlo Ponti did with Sophia Loren. The couple get married in Las Vegas in 1966, but that’s in the future.

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i soliti ignoti

1. I soliti ignoti

1958. A scene featuring Claudia Cardinale in one of her earliest roles (Italian, no subtitles but you'll have no problem getting the gist of what's going on).

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il bell'antonio

2. Il bell’Antonio

1960. The original Italian trailer without subtitles. But you don't need to understand the words to grasp the emoting that's much in evidence.

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rocco e i suoi fratelli

3. Rocco e i suoi fratelli

1960. The official trailer for the newly restored version. Claudia hardly gets a look-in but you'll catch a glimpse of a masterpiece.

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la ragazza con la valigia

4. La ragazza con la valigia

1961. A charming collage of clips from the movie with a superimposed soundtrack.

Claudia’s early films

With her son taken care of, Claudia returns to Italy so that Cristaldi can get her career up and running. She faces an immediate challenge: her Italian is little more than rudimentary and she speaks it with a French accent. What’s more, her slightly husky voice is regarded as not ideal by directors. So in most of her early films, Claudia’s voice is dubbed.

I didn’t speak a word of Italian. In my first movies everyone was shouting and I couldn’t understand anything. Then I had a small part in a Visconti film [Rocco e i suoi fratelli, 1960], in a very violent fight scene. Visconti took a megaphone and said, ‘Don’t kill my la Cardinale!’ I realised, my God, he’s noticed me!

Still, that’s a side issue for Cristaldi; he has big plans for her. Europe’s leading sex symbol of the moment is Brigitte Bardot – BB as she’s known to her fans. Claudia is to be Italy’s riposte. In a memorable one-liner, Bardot observes: “After ‘BB’ comes ‘CC’, no?” It could have turned into a fierce rivalry, but Claudia’s not in the mood to be competitive:

I was a fan of Brigitte Bardot. Who could not be? When I was young she was my idol. I loved her elegance and her natural power. She was unique.

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Claudia Cardinale looks at herself in the mirror

Claudia Cardinale looks at herself in the mirror

1961. Claudia perfects her look prior to strutting her stuff, and the set-up gives her just about every angle. That's all I know about this shot other than that there is an International Magazine Service copyright notice dated 18 December 1961 on the back of the print.

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Claudia Cardinale at the premiere of Les Lions Sont Lachés

Claudia Cardinale at the premiere of Les Lions Sont Lachés

1961. The cinema marquee in the background suggests that the occasion is the premiere of Les Lions Sont Lachés, a film in which Claudia Cardinale stars opposite Henri Verneuil. You can find out more about the paparazzi here. The back of the print is stamped by Europress and Publi-Press. The latter includes the name "H. Havrenne", who presumably is the photographer.

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Claudia Cardinale and Brigitte Bardot at an awards ceremony

Claudia Cardinale and Brigitte Bardot at an awards ceremony

1961. On the back of the print are Agence Dalmas and International Magazine Service copyright notices, the latter dated 21 December 1961. The photo was likely taken at the David di Donatello Awards held on 30 July that year by the Accademia del Cinema Italiano. Brigitte Bardot was Best Foreign Actress and Claudia Cardinale received a Special David for her performance in La ragazza con la valigia.

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Claudia Cardinale and Brigitte Bardot slug it out in a scene from Les Pétroleuses

Claudia Cardinale and Brigitte Bardot go for each other

1971. Claudia Cardinale and Brigitte Bardot slug it out in a scene from Les Pétroleuses (The Legend of Frenchie King). As well as an International Magazine Service copyright notice, there's a photographer's stamp on the back of the photo. Photo by Terry O'Neill.

The two sex symbols eventually slug it out in a hammy cat fight in a scene in Les Pétroleuses (The Legend of Frenchie King, 1971), a French spoof Western. 

Back in 1958, Claudia’s first movie turns out to be something of an international hit – I soliti ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street), a black comedy about an inept gang of thieves. She plays Carmelina, the young sister of one of the gang members, kept under lock and key lest she lose her virginity before she gets married. This is one of the films in which Claudia’s voice is dubbed, a topic on which director Mario Monicelli’s comments are revealing:

First of all because in Italy we often shoot with actors who are not professional. For example the guy who plays the Sicilian, the jealous brother Ferribotte, was not an actor. He was a dishwasher in a restaurant I would frequent. The guy who plays Capannelle, the sporty guy, wasn’t an actor either. I think he was a bricklayer. Of course Cardinale wasn’t an actress then either. But this way of shooting films was quite common in Italy, to use actors taken from the street. 

Cristaldi proves to be an astute manager and lands his protégé roles in a series of well regarded movies including Un maledetto imbroglio (The Facts of a Murder, 1958), Il bell’Antonio (Handsome Antonio, 1960) and La ragazza con la valigia (Girl with a Suitcase, 1961). LIFE magazine (29 September 1961 issue) reports that La ragazza “provides the first starring role for Claudia Cardinale, who at 22 is not yet much of an actress – but much of a delicious dish.” It fails to notice that Claudia takes acting seriously and though marketed as a sex symbol, doesn’t drink or smoke or have romances with her leading men: “I never made sexy things in my films. It is so stupid all this sex talk.” Well, yes and no…

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A seamstress makes a final adjustment to the bow on the gown Claudia Cardinale is about to model

Claudia Cardinale at Nina Ricci, Paris

1962. On the back of the photo, which is printed on Paris Match Marie Claire paper, is an International Magazine Service copyright notice dated 28 February 1962. On 10 February that year Claudia Cardinale worked as a model at Nina Ricci’s fashion house in Paris according to Getty Images. Here, a seamstress makes a final adjustment to the bow.

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Claudia Cardinale admires herself in the mirror while a seamstress adjusts her gown

Claudia Cardinale at Nina Ricci, Paris

1962. On the back of the photo are copyright notices for Agence Dalmas and International Magazine Service, the latter dated 1 March 1962. On 10 February that year Claudia Cardinale worked as a model at Nina Ricci’s fashion house in Paris. Here a seamstress is hard at work while Claudia admires herself in the mirror.

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Claudia Cardinale surrounded by Nina Ricci staff preparing her for a fashion show

Claudia Cardinale at Nina Ricci, Paris

1962. On the back of the photo are copyright notices for Agence Dalmas and International Magazine Service, the latter dated 1 March 1962. On 10 February that year Claudia Cardinale worked as a model at Nina Ricci’s fashion house in Paris. Here she is surrounded by staff preparing her for the show.

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Claudia Cardinale models a gown and matching shawl by Nina Ricci

Claudia Cardinale at Nina Ricci, Paris

1962. On the back of the photo are copyright notices for Agence Dalmas and International Magazine Service, the latter dated 28 February 1962. On 10 February that year Claudia Cardinale worked as a model at Nina Ricci’s fashion house in Paris. Here she's made it out of the dressing room and smiles at the photographer as the invited audience look on.

A year of contrasts and achievement

1963 is the year that Claudia Cardinale stakes her claim for a place in the movie pantheon. That year she works simultaneously with Luchino Visconti and Federico Fellini, and what a contrast they prove to be:

Visconti, precise, meticulous as if we were in the theatre, spoke to me in French and wanted me brunette with long hair. Fellini, messy and without a script, spoke to me in Italian and wanted me blonde.

Mid-1960s. Claudia Cardinale poses opposite a wind machine.

Luchino Visconti’s fabulous historical epic, Il gattopardo (The Leopard) tells the story of a fading aristocratic way of life. It is set at the beginning of the 1860s when Garibaldi’s landing in Sicily portends the unification and modernisation of Italy. Claudia, at her most radiant, stars alongside Burt Lancaster (cast against type and dubbed into Italian and absolutely magnificent) and Alain Delon. She says:

I was lucky to have spent so much time with Visconti. We were always together, I was always at his house, we went away together, we watched the San Remo festival together. … Before filming started we did all the rehearsals, with all the cast, around a table. It all had to be perfect. … But that dress, my God! Everything was antique. When I finished the movie, I had blood all round my waist. Visconti said, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

The film combines superb acting with sumptuous period sets and stunning photography and concludes with a wonderful 45-minute ball scene that apparently takes two weeks to put together. It goes on to win the 1963 Palme d’Or at Cannes as well as achieving commercial success in Europe. Unfortunately the version released in the US is horribly hacked about, poorly dubbed and transferred to an inferior print that dulls its colours. No wonder it sinks without trace. So, if you’re going to watch The Leopard, and you should, make sure you have the restored uncut version.

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leopard trailer

Il gattopardo (The Leopard)

The US trailer, dubbed of course, marketing the movie as a latter-day Gone with Wind, introduced by Burt Lancaster.

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leopard dance scene

Il gattopardo (The Leopard)

Part of the final act of the film, Don Fabrizio’s (Burt Lancaster) unbearably poignant dance with Angelica (Claudia Cardinale).

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otto bfi trailer

Otto e mezzo (8½)

A UK trailer released by the British Film Institute for a new restored version of the film.

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otto claudia

Otto e mezzo (8½)

A collage of clips, all featuring Claudia Cardinale – ravishing but no dialogue.

The intellectual rigour of Il gattopardo is in stark contrast to Otto e mezzo’s (8½) visually expressed emotions. 

In Otto e mezzo, Marcello Mastroianni is Guido Anselmi, a fêted film director, all set to make another box-office hit except for one thing – he doesn’t have a plot. Guido is, to all intents and purposes, Fellini himself and the film, morphing between reality and fantasy, is told from the director’s perspective. Claudia Cardinale plays herself, who also happens to be Guido’s ideal woman – in his imagination, that is. Real life’s another matter. Ms Cardinale has fond memories of Fellini:

Mid-1960s. Claudia Cardinale inspects her makeup.

He was a very funny man. He would pick me up in the car to take me to the set. … He would go down on his knees for me, he adored me, he got angry if he didn’t think I was eating enough. He used to say to me: “You belong to Africa, to the Earth. That’s why you’re my muse.”

He made me feel the centre of the Earth, the most beautiful, the most important. I truly miss him, his sweetness, tenderness, his thin voice even. Acting for him was like an event, there was no script, the set was noisy, it was chaotic, anarchy reigned, yet he was able to isolate himself and get on with the job. You thought you were doing everything spontaneously, any which way you pleased, but at the end of the day you’d done exactly what he had in mind. … With Federico, it was all improvisation.

Otto e mezzo goes on to win an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and is now considered to be one of the greatest and most influential films of all time. As for Claudia, in 1963, she appears on the covers of over 250 European magazines and fan letters pour through her (agent’s) letterbox at the rate of over a thousand a month, including hundreds of marriage proposals. In spite of which, she remains modest about her talent and aware that the careers of movie stars are inherently precarious.

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Luchino Visconti directing Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale

Luchino Visconti directing Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale

1963. Luchino Visconti, an obsessional perfectionist by all accounts, arranges Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale before shooting a scene for Il gattopardo. On the back of the print is an International Magazine Service copyright notice dated 15 July 1963.

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Claudia Cardinale with the screenplay of The Leopard

Claudia Cardinale with the screenplay of The Leopard

1963. Claudia Cardinale sits outside with the screenplay of The Leopard – interesting that it appears to be an English version. The photo was likely taken in the garden of the Palazzo Valguarnera Gangi in Palermo, where much of the shooting took place.

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Claudia Cardinale signing autographs

Claudia Cardinale signs autographs

1963. Claudia Cardinale in the gardens of Palermo's Palazzo Valguarnera Gangi while shooting Il gattopardo. Hands stretch through the palace gates in search of autographs and the actress responds. Photo by Patrice Habans.

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Claudia Cardinale filming a scene for Otto e mezzo

Claudia Cardinale films Otto e mezzo

1963. Claudia Cardinale films a somewhat surreal scene for Federico Fellini's masterpiece, Otto e mezzo.

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Two dressers fasten Claudia Cardinale into a period gown

Claudia Cardinale dresses up

1963. On the back of this publicity shot for Il gattopardo featuring Claudia Cardinale is stamped a quite wonderful coat of arms featuring a leopard. There are also stamps from Pathé-Titanus-20th Century Fox and Imapress and a printed caption (the original is in French):

Claudia CARDINALE tries the dresses she will wear in “THE LEOPARD", a film directed by Luchino VISCONTI and based on Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's novel. The fitting session lasted eight hours. She was surprised that after standing for such a long time, she felt a little tired. But everyone knows that no professional model accepts this type of work for more than four hours.

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Claudia Cardinale being laced up by her dresser on the set of Il gattopardo

Claudia Cardinale being laced up by her dresser

1963. Claudia Cardinale, preparing to shoot a scene for Il gattopardo, puts on a brave face as her dresser laces her up. To get that period hourglass figure requires a viciously constrictive corset and the experience sticks in Claudia's mind: "When I finished the movie, I had blood all round my waist."

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Contact sheet, Il gattopardo

Contact sheet, Il gattopardo

1963. A contact sheet containing shots taken on the set of Il gattopardo. Featured are behind-the-scenes personnel as well as Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale.

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Federico Fellini and Claudia Cardinale on the set of Otto e mezzo

Federico Fellini and Claudia Cardinale on the set of Otto e mezzo

1963. Claudia Cardinale describes Federico Fellini as "a very funny man." Here he shares a joke with her and she's clearly very relaxed and enjoying herself. On the back of the print are copyright notices for Agence de Presse Dalmas and International Magazine Service, the latter dated 17 June 1963.

Once upon a time in Hollywood

It would be surprising had the Hollywood studios not wanted to get in on the action. This puts Claudia (or more likely Cristaldi) in the driving seat when it comes to negotiating contracts:

My main advantage was that I didn’t ask to go to Hollywood, they called me. In those days whenever a new star caught their attention, the Hollywood studios had to have him or her, they tried to monopolise all the stars. They tied you down with a contract and in a way destroyed your career. I tried to defend myself. For instance I refused an exclusive contract with Universal and only signed one contract at a time and managed to survive.

Her debut is in Blake Edwards’ The Pink Panther (1963), a slapstick comedy starring David Niven as a jewel thief and Peter Sellers as an inept detective. Claudia is an exotic princess. Other movies she makes during her stint in Hollywood showcase her versatility. They include Circus World (1964, a drama), Blindfold (1965, a romantic comedy) and The Professionals (1966, a Western).

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Claudia Cardinale surrounded by photographs of herself

Claudia Cardinale surrounded by photographs of herself

1962. Claudia Cardinale beams at the camera, as well she may. On the back of the print is a copyright notice for Guglielmo Coluzzi. He has three films to his credit as a stills photographer on IMDb but he seems to have worked also as a paparazzo. You can find a selection of his work at Rome's il museo del louvre.

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Claudia Cardinale posing for Franco Rossi

Claudia Cardinale posing for Franco Rossi

1967. A caption (translated from the original French) on the back of the print outlines what’s going on in Claudia’s life:

Claudia Cardinale has barely returned from America after completing her role in the film "The Professionals" with Burt Lancaster. She is due in Paris in a few days to make agreements with producer Marcel Pagnol about the film "The Baker's Wife" alongside Zero Mostel. Meanwhile, Claudia is dubbing her film "A Rose for All" (with her in the photo is director Franco Rossi). She has also made a lot of purchases because she is finishing furnishing her new house on Via Flaminia.

It looks like La Femme du Boulanger didn’t go into production. According to IMDb, Franco Rossi’s film, A Rose for All (Una rosa per tutti), was released in the US in 1967 as Every Man’s Woman. There are agency stamps on the back of the print for Pierluigi, Marie Claire and APIS.

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Claudia Cardinale poses for a girl with a camera

Claudia Cardinale poses for a girl with a camera

1965. Claudia Cardinale poses for a girl with a camera, and a pretty meaningful one at that. The identity of the girl behind the camera is a mystery, but the photographer responsible for this shot is identified on the back of the print as Araldo De Crollalanza. (There is also an Ifot International Foto Service stamp.) Unfortunately, there's almost no information about Araldo De Crollalanza online, plus searches tend to throw of a Fascist politician with the same name.

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Claudia Cardinale and Philip Dunne looking through a camera on the set of Blindfold

Claudia Cardinale and Philip Dunne on the set of Blindfold

1965. A caption on the back of the photo sets the scene:

CAMERA EYE
Director Philip Dunne and Italy’s most exciting new star Claudia Cardinale, look through the camera on the set of “Blindfold,” a Universal-Seven Pictures’ suspense comedy in which Miss Cardinale makes her Hollywood film debut opposite Rock Hudson.

Claudia and Rock will go on to become close friends.

But Claudia, no fool and increasingly independent-minded, recognises the dangers as well as the advantages that working in Hollywood entails. Her thinking is spelled out in an article in the 8 July 1966 issue of LIFE magazine headlined Claudia Cardinale, a wary beauty, is afraid Hollywood will ruin her:

Claudia Cardinale has a problem. … Her problem is, now that she has finally agreed to work in Hollywood, she is afraid she will be over-glamorized and exploited as Sophia [Loren] was. Her first Hollywood movie, the recent Blindfold, confirms Claudia’s worst fears. And she has two more coming up soon. Between Hollywood chores, she rushes away to make films in Italy, Spain, Brazil, anywhere but Hollywood. It is a strenuous way to conduct a career, but Claudia, who has won several top acting awards, is trying to grow into a better actress. She gets paid less in Europe. “If you have to give up the money, give it up, she insists. I do not want to become a cliché.”

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pink panther excerpt

1. The Pink Panther

1963. Claudia Cardinale getting plastered and flirting with David Niven – a lovely combination of innocence and seduction.

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pink panther interview

2. The Pink Panther

Claudia Cardinale reminiscing (in French with subtitles) about The Pink Panther and other films, illustrated with video clips.

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once upon a time trailer

3. Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. The original trailer in high definition of Once Upon a Time in the West directed by Sergio Leone and starring Charles Bronson, Jason Robards, Henry Fonda and Claudia Cardinale.

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once upon a time late scene

4. Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. A farewell scene, close to the end of the movie, where the close-ups, the pacing and the soundtrack are just perfect.

After a few years, she does indeed move back permanently to Europe. More significant than any of her Hollywood movies is the spaghetti western in which she subsequently stars: Once Upon a Time in the West (1968). Although it proves popular with neither critics nor audiences on its release, it will become a cult classic. And once again, Claudia Cardinale offers insights into what it’s like working, in this case, with director Sergio Leone and co-stars Charles Bronson and Henry Fonda:

I was the only woman in that movie! The thing is … I love music. And that was the first time I worked on a film where the music was composed [by Ennio Morricone] before the cameras started rolling. So before shooting my scenes, Sergio would play the music … which really helped me get into the part. … On set, Charlie Bronson never talked to anybody. And Henry Fonda, we started shooting that love scene in the hammock and he told me he’d never done a love scene before. … It was difficult. His wife was sitting next to the camera, staring at me the whole time.

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Charles Bronson and Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

Charles Bronson and Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Storyline. Once Upon a Time in the West is the story of a woman thrust into a world where threat and violence are everywhere. The three main male protagonists are played by Charles Bronson, Jason Robards and Henry Fonda.

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Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Jill. Claudia Cardinale plays Jill McBain, a former New Orleans prostitute. In spite of that, she turns out to be the moral force at the heart of the movie. She’s a strong woman who sticks to her principles and refuses to be intimidated. We see much of the film through her eyes.

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Sergio Leone photographs Claudia Cardinale

Sergio Leone photographs Claudia Cardinale

1968. Shooting. Once Upon a Time in the West is a spaghetti western. Other than a few scenes in Utah’s Monument Valley, the outdoor action was filmed in Spain, while the indoor scenes were shot at Cinecittà.

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Claudia Cardinale with members of the crew of Once Upon a Time in the West

Claudia Cardinale and followers on the set of Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Directorial style. The film has a very distinctive style. Tight close-ups of faces contrast with vast panoramas, the oh-so-slow pacing is interrupted by explosions of violence, music plays a vital role in setting the mood but much of the soundtrack relies on natural sounds. Photo by Angelo Frontoni.

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Claudia Cardinale and Jason Robards in Once Upon a Time in the West

Claudia Cardinale and Jason Robards in Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Soundtrack. One of the film’s most celebrated aspects is the soundtrack by Ennio Morricone. Each of the characters is given their own musical leitmotif, and there’s also one for the spirit of the American West. The haunting wordless vocals for Claudia Cardinale’s character, Jill, are sung by Edda Dell’Orso.

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Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Claudia. As Jill, Claudia Cardinale is under the spotlight as, to all intents and purposes, she plays the only female character. She rises to the challenge by managing to convey a gamut of emotions including loss, disappointment, regret, determination and courage. Photo by Pietro Pascuttini.

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Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Dubbing. When filming was finished, Once Upon a Time in the West was dubbed into several languages, including Italian, French, German, Spanish and English. In the English version, Claudia Cardinale was dubbed by actress Joyce Gordon.

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Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

Claudia Cardinale in Once Upon a Time in the West

1968. Title and theme. The original Italian title, C’era una volta il West, correctly translates as Once Upon a Time There Was a West. That’s important. The film is not so much about a story that takes place in the American West as it is about a mythical West and how it came to an end with the arrival of capitalism (the railway) and female values (Jill).

Independence and a new direction

Claudia Cardinale married Franco Cristaldi in 1966 but she leaves him to marry film director Pasquale Squitieri in 1975. At the same time she terminates her contract with Vides Films. Unsurprisingly, this impacts her professional as well as her personal life:

Well, it was a shock. Meeting Pasquale I interrupted a system that was built with and around me. Cristaldi was a very important producer and nobody wanted to go against him, nobody wanted to oppose him. So I don’t know if it was he who wanted it or if it was an involuntary consequence, but certainly both Pasquale and I found obstacles in the work. And this is a certain fact.

1965. Claudia Cardinale with Luchino Visconti on the set of Sandra.

The good news is that Claudia’s career is no longer being managed by someone else. She can do as she chooses – not that she’s been exactly passive up to now. Still:

For more than 15 years, I was considered and treated like an object or a project to be manufactured and merchandised. For much of my adult life, I was someone else’s creation – they decided what movies I should play in, what clothes to wear, how to have my hair done and even what friends to see. It was as if I were something operated by remote control.

She believes that “Women, after all, are capable of more in life than making love – but it is very difficult to find intelligent parts for women in films.” She continues to be busy but in Cristaldi’s absence, judging by reviews, the quality of the films in which she stars does drop off to an extent.

Her favourite and most acclaimed movie from the 1980s is Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo (1982). Hertzog’s approach to film-making is both uncompromising and notorious in the industry. He disregards storyboards, emphasises improvisation, and puts his cast and crew into situations like those of the characters in the film.

Set in the early 20th century, the plot of Fitzcarraldo revolves around an Irishman who wants to build the largest opera house in the world in the middle of the Amazon jungle. The making of the movie is the subject of a feature-length documentary – Burden of Dreams (1982). Claudia remembers it as a pretty surreal experience:

But the greatest adventure was with Werner Herzog, making Fitzcarraldo in Peru. I don’t know how I survived! We were in the middle of the jungle. Wild animals. You didn’t know what to eat. All the Indians were naked. My costume was this white dress, and they thought I was a goddess, so I had to be on set all the time otherwise the Indians would leave. When we finished, they came to the airport and brought me gifts. I was crying so much! I love Werner Herzog, but for some of the crew, the experience was so powerful they actually went insane. … We worked in extreme conditions, it was unbearably hot, Jason Robards at some point climbed up a tree and demanded a New York steak to come down. Eventually he was replaced by Klaus Kinski.

Claudia plays Kinski’s lover, a successful brothel-keeper who finances his demented project. Vincent Canby of The New York Times points out that although she doesn’t have much time on screen, she sets the movie’s comic tone and manages to turn Kinski into a “genuinely charming screen presence,” something he’s not exactly noted for. Herzog’s diary seems to confirm this. The director observes that Claudia Cardinale is an antidote to her co-star’s megalomania, “a great help because she is such a good sport, a real trouper, and has a special radiance before the camera. In her presence, [Kinski] usually acts like a gentleman.”

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fitzcarraldo trailer

1. Fitzcarraldo

The original trailer in high definition of Fitzcarraldo directed by Werner Herzog and starring Klaus Kinski, Claudia Cardinale, José Lewgoy and Miguel Ángel Fuentes.

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cardinale herzog conversation

2. Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo notebook

Claudia Cardinale in conversation with Werner Herzog about the notebook he kept while making Fitzcarraldo.

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burden of dreams

3. Burden of Dreams

A minute and a half from Burden of Dreams, Les Blank's feature-length documentary of the tumultuous production of Fitzcarraldo.

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kermode on fitzcarraldo

4. Mark Kermode reviews Fitzcarraldo

A couple of minutes that focus as much on the story behind the film as on the film itself.

Fitzcarraldo wins the Palme d’Or at Cannes.

Claudia Cardinale’s ongoing career and reflections

Claudia Cardinale just keeps going. By 2022 she has 128 credits as a movie actress on IMDb. This in spite of embarking on a career in the theatre in 2000, age 62. Reflecting on her choices and her experience, she says:

As a teenager I was wild, a bit crazy, a tomboy, I got into fistfights with boys just to show them girls can be stronger than them. I have always accepted challenges. When I was young, I remember catching the train after it had pulled out, I used to run and jump on even though I was on the platform, perfectly in time for the departure, just to show I could do it. This attitude also helped me on set when I found myself the only woman surrounded by men, I wasn’t intimidated, I felt able to compete with them. My philosophy of life has always been: If you want, you can. You can’t be weak if you want to do this job. … If you’re not strong, you lose your personality. … You play the role in front of the camera but you have to know who you are afterwards. Inner strength is the most important.

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Claudia Cardinale at her dressing table

Claudia Cardinale at her dressing table

1962. The expression on Claudia Cardinale's face suggests that she's a lot of fun. Love the caricatures of herself flanking the mirror. The photo is printed on Paris Match Marie Claire paper and has an International Magazine Service copyright stamp on the back dated 5 March 1962.

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Claudia Cardinale posing for Franco Rossi

Claudia Cardinale posing for Franco Rossi

1967. A caption (translated from the original French) on the back of the print outlines what’s going on in Claudia’s life:

Claudia Cardinale has barely returned from America after completing her role in the film "The Professionals" with Burt Lancaster. She is due in Paris in a few days to make agreements with producer Marcel Pagnol about the film "The Baker's Wife" alongside Zero Mostel. Meanwhile, Claudia is dubbing her film "A Rose for All" (with her in the photo is director Franco Rossi). She has also made a lot of purchases because she is finishing furnishing her new house on Via Flaminia.

It looks like La Femme du Boulanger didn’t go into production. According to IMDb, Franco Rossi’s film, A Rose for All (Una rosa per tutti), was released in the US in 1967 as Every Man’s Woman. There are agency stamps on the back of the print for Pierluigi, Marie Claire and APIS.

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Claudia Cardinale larking about with Sammy Davis Jr

Claudia Cardinale larking about with Sammy Davis Jr

Around 1963. There's no information at all on this photo or its companion. The subject and style suggest they were taken in Claudia's early days in the US. She and Sammy do seem to be having a rare old time. In both shots, the photographer has ensured that she doesn't look taller than him (Sammy was 5 foot 6 inches tall). Here, he has him crouching and peeping out from behind her.

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Claudia Cardinale larking about with Sammy Davis Jr

Claudia Cardinale larking about with Sammy Davis Jr

Around 1963. There's no information at all on this photo or its companion. The subject and style suggest they were taken in Claudia's early days in the US. She and Sammy do seem to be having a rare old time. In both shots, the photographer has ensured that she doesn't look taller than him (Sammy was 5 foot 6 inches tall). Here, he has him on a stool.

One aspect of that is her determination not to get involved with her co-stars. How else could she possibly reject the advances of the likes of Marcello Mastroianni, Alain Delon and Jean Paul Belmondo?

Yes, they courted me, I confess. But I have always wanted to separate the life of an actress from my private one. So I didn’t let myself be seduced. We were friends, we joked, but I didn’t go further also because I knew how much the stories were embroidered on the sets.

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Claudia Cardinale descending a staircase

Claudia Cardinale descending a staircase

1961. That's a very stylish window. Not sure the carpet is the perfect match. There are agency stamps on the back of the print for Agence Dalmas and International Magazine Service, the latter dated 21 August 1961.

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Claudia Cardinale posing in a doorway

Claudia Cardinale posing in a doorway

1961. This must be part of the same shoot as the staircase photo. Not only is Claudia wearing the same shift dress. There are the same agency stamps on the back of the print for Agence Dalmas and International Magazine Service, the latter dated 21 August 1961.

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Claudia Cardinale in a baroque setting

Claudia Cardinale in a baroque setting

Around 1961. The photographer has signed the back of the print and identified the location as Paris. Photo by Peter Basch.

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Claudia Cardinale posing on a gangway

Claudia Cardinale posing on a gangway

1968. Printed on Paris-Match Marie Claire paper and stamped in ink on the reverse ‘COPYRIGHT / INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE / SERVICE (IMS) / 7 DEC 1968 / TORSGAT. 21 STOCKHOLM SWEDEN’. Also annotated in pencil ‘PM 923 C. Cardinale’.

But she makes an exception for Rock Hudson:

We were very close. At that time in America if it was known that you were gay you could not work in Hollywood. So we pretended to be a couple. Always arm in arm around town. Rock had lunch and dinner at my place a lot. I stayed close to him to the very end.

He in turn is protective of Claudia, aware of her discomfort in the US.

1964. Claudia Cardinale at the Gala of the Union of Artists at Winter Circus, Paris. Photo by Philippe Le Tellier.

Claudia’s awards and achievements

Claudia Cardinale has won numerous awards including a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 1993 Venice Film Festival and a Golden Bear for Lifetime Achievement at the 2002 Berlin Film Festival. Between those two in 1999 she was awarded the Légion d’Honneur in France and later, in 2001 and 2002, corresponding honours in Portugal and Italy.

In March 2000 she became UNESCO goodwill ambassador for the defence of women’s rights.

Want to know more about Claudia Cardinale?

The quotes above are from various sources. Sometimes I’ve combined quotes from different sources because they’re on the same topic. In these cases I’ve used an ellipsis (…) to separate them.

The Continental Actress by Kerry Segrave and Linda Martin has a chapter on Claudia Cardinale. Online sources include:

  • Claudia Cardinale’s website – official but limited
  • Wikipedia – much more detailed, complete with citations
  • IMDb – go-to website for Claudia’s filmography
  • TCM – worth a visit but not available in all countries.

Also online, there are articles about and interviews with Claudia in the Los Angeles Times, The Local, Breaking Latest News, Italy magazine, Euronews, The Guardian, Variety, Dazed and Vanity Fair.

Other topics you might be interested in…

Elsa Martinelli – Italy’s sassy Audrey Hepburn
Gina Lollobrigida – the temptress of the Tiber
Monica Vitti
Monica Vitti – a sad childhood, a glittering career and a bitter old age
Princess Ira von Fürstenberg – celeb, fashion model, movie star
Tazio Secchiaroli – more than a paparazzo
Yvonne Furneaux as Emma in La Dolce Vita
Yvonne Furneaux – glamorous English export

Filed Under: Films, Stars Tagged With: 8½, Alain Delon, Anneaux d'or, Big Deal on Madonna Street, Blake Edwards, Blindfold, Brigitte Bardot, Burden of Dreams, Cannes Film Festival, Charles Bronson, Circus World, Claudia Cardinale, Ennio Morricone, Federico Fellini, Fitzcarraldo, Franco Cristaldi, Girl with a Suitcase, Goha, Handsome Antonio, Henry Fonda, I soliti ignoti, Il bell’Antonio, Il gattopardo, Jason Robards, Klaus Kinski, La ragazza con la valigia, Luchino Visconti, Marcello Mastroianni, Mario Monicelli, Once Upon a Time in the West, Otto e mezzo, Palme d’Or, Pasquale Squitieri, Rocco and his Brothers, Rocco e i suoi fratelli, Rock Hudson, Sergio Leone, The Facts of a Murder, The Leopard, The Pink Panther, The Professionals, Un maledetto imbroglio, UNESCO, Venice Film Festival, Vides Films, Werner Herzog

Sex and power – Nazism in 1970s cinema

Tasteless, gratuitous smut or challenging cult classics? In the late-1960s and 1970s a clutch of art-house films by Italian directors found new, confrontational ways to explore the rise of fascism.

The stage was set by Luchino Visconti’s The Damned (1969), followed a year later by Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Conformist (1970). 1974 saw the release of Liliana Cavani’s The Night Porter and Lina Wertmüller’s Seven Beauties, with Pier Paulo Pasolini’s Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1976) bringing down the curtain.

Luchino Visconti directing Charlotte Rampling and Reinhard Kolldehoff on the set of The Damned
1969. Luchino Visconti directing Charlotte Rampling and Reinhard Kolldehoff on the set of The Damned.

Sex and power – sex as a metaphor for tyranny

These are great, if controversial, films with intriguing plots, extravagant drama, superb actors, gorgeous sets and stylish costumes. But their tone is dark and pessimistic, their subject matter grim, transgressive and voyeuristic. They make for thrillingly uncomfortable viewing.

They portray the Nazi regime as evil incarnate. Against a broader historical backdrop, they chart its ascendancy and consequences for individuals, relationships and the body politic. The underlying narrative seems to run something like this…

  • Capitalism is corrupt and corrupting.
  • It leads inexorably to power plays, tyranny and repression at every level of society, from the family to the state.
  • Along with all of this come a range of other perverse behaviours such as duplicity, betrayal and sexual deviance.
  • Capitalism, tyranny and perversion create a death spiral of paranoia and destruction from which escape, let alone redemption, is all but impossible.
  • This toxic cocktail finds its ultimate expression in the sado-masochistic excesses of Nazism.

The most striking characteristic of these films is that they equate sexual deviance with tyranny, or “totalitarianism”, to use a word that was much in vogue at the time. Sexual domination is a metaphor for political domination; non-heterosexual desires are a symptom of political depravity. This is troubling, not least for a contemporary audience with a less binary attitude towards sexuality.

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The Damned

1969. The Damned

Luchino Visconti's The Damned is a magnificent failure, an example of a great director working at the peak of his ability and somehow creating almost nothing at all. Surely no one else could have made this film; surely no one at all should have. It is one of the most impenetrable films ever made.
Roger Ebert, 5 February 1970

Luchino Visconti's The Damned may be the chef d'oeuvre  of the great Italian director – a spectacle of such greedy passion, such uncompromising sensation, and such obscene shock that it makes you realize how small and safe and ordinary most movies are. Experiencing it is like taking a whiff of ammonia—it's not conventionally pleasant, but it makes you see the outlines of everything around you with just a little more clarity.
Vincent Canby, The New York Times, 19 December 1969

Visconti has always been a master of melodrama, often working with large, operatic gestures (his Senso, in fact begins with an opera), and The Damned, with its numerous early singspiels and cabaret performances (particularly the memorable drag number of actor Helmut Berger [as Martin Essenbeck] impersonating Marlene Dietrich) are often outrageously theatrical.
Douglas Messerli, World Cinema Review, 23 September 2013

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The Conformist

1970. The Conformist

The Conformist, an adaptation of the novel by Alberto Moravia, is a superior chronicle film that equates the rise and fall of Italian Fascism, from the early 1920s until 1943, with the short, dreadful, very romantic life of Marcello, a young man for whom conformity becomes a kind of obsession after a traumatic homosexual encounter in his youth.
Vincent Canby, The New York Times, 19 September 1970

A beautifully imagined portrait of moral and political cowardice, it stars Jean-Louis Trintignant as Clerici, a Mussolini-era aristocrat who is so bent on appearing “normal” that he volunteers to spy on his old university tutor for the secret police.
Anthony Quinn, The Independent, 29 February 2008

Bernardo Bertolucci's expressionist masterpiece of 1970, The Conformist, is the movie that plugs postwar Italian cinema firmly and directly into the emerging 1970s renaissance in Hollywood film-making.
Stuart Jeffries, The Guardian, 20 October 2010

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the night porter 1

1974. The Night Porter

If you don't love pain, you won't find The Night Porter erotic—and by now, even painbuffs may be satiated with Nazi decadence. The movie reunites a former SS officer (Dirk Bogarde) and a young woman (Charlotte Rampling) who was raped by him during her adolescence in a concentration camp.
Nora Sayre, The New York Times, 2 October 1974

The Night Porter is as nasty as it is lubricious, a despicable attempt to titillate us by exploiting memories of persecution and suffering. It is (I know how obscene this sounds) Nazi chic.
Roger Ebert, 10 February 1975

The movie is a splinter torn from a wave of so-called “Nazi chic” that swept across world cinema in the early 1970s, mostly in the hands of directors out of Germany and Italy. I suspect there was a need for movies of this nature at that time, mostly as a therapy to their filmmakers; the fascism that ran rampant through both countries during World War II caused considerable atrocity, and film was used by conflicted auteurs as a way to defuse the past and give it finality, and meaning.
David M Keyes, Cinemaphile, 15 July 2013

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salo

1976. Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom

For all of Mr. Pasolini's desire to make "Salo" an abstract statement, one cannot look at images of people being scalped, whipped, gouged, slashed, covered with excrement and sometimes eating it and react abstractedly unless one shares the director's obsessions.
Vincent Canby, The New York Times, 1 October 1977

Through a panoply of the unspeakable – blood, excrement, torture and murder – Salò comments on the exercise of power, and on a consumer culture where a limitless choice of gratifications disguises an absence of all choice and all resistance.
Gary Indiana, The Guardian, 22 September 2000

Pasolini’s radical political insights regarding Sade, Fascism, and the violence at the heart of all culture came through brilliantly, but the scenes of torture were agony to watch, and, back out on the street after the sun had set, the world itself seemed spoiled upon contact with them. I wondered, literally, how I’d go on living withsuch knowledge.
Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 11 May 2010

Sex and power – products of their time

These films are palpably products of their time and in their own way feel just as dated now as the films noir of the 1940s and the musicals of the 1950s.

They emerged from a period of social and political turmoil in Italy that ran from the late-1960s to the early-1980s and was marked by a wave of left-wing and right-wing terrorist incidents. During the period, nearly 2,000 murders were attributed to political violence in the form of bombings, assassinations and street warfare between rival militant factions.

The films’ political message is rooted in the socialist / communist ideology that had gained currency (particularly in academic and artistic circles) during the 1960s and had erupted on the streets of Paris in 1968 but was increasingly questioned during the 1970s. The Nazis provide the protagonists, costumes and settings for restaging and exploring in the present the historical failure of democracy.

Bear in mind too that for many in 1970 the end of World War II was recent history, just 25 years away – the equivalent for us would be looking back at the 1990s. Visconti, Cavani, Wertmüller and Pasolini had all lived through the war (Bertolucci was born during it) and their films may well have been in part at least a way of coming to terms with events they had witnessed. At the same time a new generation was coming of age who had not themselves lived through the war and its immediate aftermath.

Anita Strindberg and Florinda Bolkan in a scene from A Lizard in a Woman's Skin
1971. Anita Strindberg and Florinda Bolkan in a scene from A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin, a highly regarded giallo. Photo by Antonio Benetti.

At the same time, the permissiveness of the 1960s had loosened the moral code and opened the door for more explicit on-screen sex, torture and other forms of bad behaviour. A parallel development was that of the giallo, a genre of Italian pulp movie nicely characterized by Cheryl Eddie for Gizmodo:

Nearly all [the films] contain gushing gore, erotic themes, a heavy emphasis on visuals (with things like script coherence often taking a back seat), questionable / campy English dubbing, characters gripped by paranoia, gorgeous women in peril, and ruthlessly brutal masked killers fond of sharp objects, rope, and black leather gloves.

Significantly, it was in the mid-1970s that Susan Sontag published a piece on Fascinating Fascism. in which she noted the renewed interest in Nazism and its eroticization. She also observed that “Courses dealing with the history of fascism are, along with those on the occult (including vampirism), among the best attended these days on college campuses.” So clearly something was in the air.

Perhaps these films about the rise of fascism were also a reaction to the camp frivolity churned out of Cinecittà during the latter half of the 1960s – movies like Barbarella (1968) and Danger: Diabolik (1968).

Whatever the influences, this clutch of films was made possible commercially by the emergence during the 1960s of European art-house cinema as a force to be reckoned with thanks to work by the likes of Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Jean-Luc Godard, Ingmar Bergman and Andrei Tarkovsky.

Ingrid Thulin as Baroness Sophie Von Essenbeck in The Damned
1969. Ingrid Thulin as Baroness Sophie Von Essenbeck in The Damned.

Sex and power – the actresses

These films showcase the talents of some of the leading European actresses of the period. In fact a number of them keep reappearing in these and related films of the period.

Foremost among them is Charlotte Rampling, an English actress, who plays the female lead opposite Dirk Bogarde in The Night Porter as well as having an important and very different role in The Damned. She worked as a model before capturing the attention of cinemagoers with her performance in Georgy Girl (1966). She continues to appear in films (not least François Ozon’s Swimming Pool), on TV and on the stage. Outside of the movie world, she features, posing naked on a table at the Hotel Nord Pinus in Arles, in one of Helmut Newton’s most celebrated photographs.

Alongside Greta Garbo and Ingrid Bergman, Ingrid Thulin is regarded by many as Sweden’s female contribution to international cinema. She was one of Ingmar Bergman’s muses and appeared in seven of his films, beginning with Wild Strawberries (1957), for which she won best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival the following year. In The Damned, she is the cold-blooded Baroness Sophie Von Essenbeck, a cross between a latter-day Lady Macbeth and Hamlet’s mother, Gertrude. She also appears in Tinto Brass’s proto-Nazisploitation film, Salon Kitty (1976).

French actress Dominique Sanda was 18 years old when Bernardo Bertolucci asked her to play the part of Anna in The Conformist. The same year Vittorio De Sica cast her as Micòl Finzi Contini in his movie about the fate of a Jewish family in 1938 Italy, The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970). She was subsequently recruited by Luchino Visconti for an uncredited role in Conversation Piece (1974) and again by Bertolucci to play the ill-fated Ada in 1900. She won the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival for her performance in The Inheritance (1976).

Bernardo Bertolucci cast Stefania Sandrelli in the two great historical films about Italy that he made in the 1970s: The Conformist and 1900. Her breakthrough film was Divorce Italian Style (1961) – she was just 15 years old at the time. In the 1970s she worked with director Ettore Scola as well as Bernardo Bertolucci before, in the 1980s, making a name for herself as an erotic actress in Tinto Brass’s The Key (1983).

You must set a portfolio id.

Sex and power – the reception

When these films were released, the savagery of the Nazi regime and the horrors of the Holocaust were still fresh in people’s minds, so the subject matter was always going to be controversial.

The Damned opened to worldwide acclaim and was the tenth most popular movie at the French box office in 1970. It received an Oscar nomination for Best Screenplay and was named Best Foreign Film by the National Board of Review, with Helmut Berger was singled out for particular praise.

Charlotte Rampling in The Night Porter
1974. Charlotte Rampling in The Night Porter.

The Conformist dropped quickly from sight after rave receptions at several film festivals. It got only a very, very limited run in the US after the likes of Francis Ford Coppola urged Paramount to release it. Nor was it a big hit in Italy because it provided audiences with an uncomfortable reminder of fascism’s comparatively recent popularity. It is now something of a cult movie and regarded by many as a masterpiece.

The Night Porter provoked mixed responses. Liliana Cavani was praised by some for having the courage to deal with the theme of sexual transgression but many couldn’t accept the Holocaust setting. Elite-critic Roger Ebert was far from alone when he called it “as nasty as it is lubricious, a despicable attempt to titillate us by exploiting memories of persecution and suffering.”

Seven Beauties upset many with its graphic depiction of Nazi concentration camps as the context for a sick joke about its leading character’s survival. In spite of that, it did well in the US and was nominated for four Oscars, including best director.

Not surprisingly given its graphic portrayals of rape, torture, and murder, Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom was widely regarded as obscene and banned in several countries. In some the ban remains to this day. The film has never reached a mass audience but many critics now see it as an important work and required viewing for serious cinephiles.

Sex and power – the legacy

In the political arena, the message of these movies about the Nazis failed to make an impact. By the late-1970s / early-1980s the dominant ideologies were those of the free-marketeers (as personified by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan) and the anarchists (as embodied by the punks).

Around 1980. Das Schwimmbad – Nazi chic by Bob Carlos Clarke.

Perhaps for all their sensationalism these films failed to appeal to a broad enough audience. More likely, they turned out to be a late flowering of 1960s thinking, and by the time they were released the pendulum had already begun to swing in another direction.

Ironically, in the cultural / artistic arena these films ended up spawning a whole sub-genre of exploitation movies – Nazisploitation. Nazisploitation films appropriated the lavish decadence of The Damned, the psychodrama of The Night Porter or the S&M of Salò to create a sensationalist cocktail of sex and violence. The most celebrated product of the genre is Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (1975). But there was clearly something in the air – Love Camp 7 (1969) was released the same year as The Damned.

In mainstream cinema, the most obvious progeny of these films about the Nazis is Cabaret (1972). In stills photography, Nazi chic is implicit or explicit in the work of Helmut Newton, Chris von Wangenheim and Bob Carlos Clarke. And, by extension, is it going to too far to discern a link between these films and the broad-shouldered, power dressing that took the fashion world by storm in the late-’70s?

Want to know more about sex and power?

A good starting point is Samm Deighan’s article for Diabolique magazine: Post-War Perversion in Italian Cinema: From Visconti to Pasolini, Part One and Part Two. To go deeper, take a look at Screen Nazis: Cinema, History, and Democracy by Sabine Hake or Nazisploitation!: The Nazi Image in Low-Brow Cinema and Culture by Elizabeth Bridges.

Other topics you may be interested in…

Donyale Luna – the fashion world’s wayward moon-child
Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford in a passionate embrace
Gilda – the movie that made Rita Hayworth into a bombshell
Barbara Stanwyck in The Two Mrs Carrolls
Unsafe sex – the starlet’s dilemma

Filed Under: Crew, Films, Stars Tagged With: Bernardo Bertolucci, Bob Carlos Clarke, Charlotte Rampling, Dominique Sanda, Ingrid Thulin, Liliana Cavani, Lina Wertmüller, Luchino Visconti, or the 120 Days of Sodom, Pier Paulo Pasolini, Salò, Seven Beauties, Stefania Sandrelli, The Conformist, The Damned, The Night Porter

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