| |
THE GARDEN
OF THE FINZI-CONTINIS ( Italy )
OCTOBER 2011
Serious readers were shocked in 1971 when Vittorio de Sica announced
he had finally (after ten years of trying) obtained financing
to adapt Giorgio Bassani's well-regarded novel The Garden of
the Finzi-Continis for the screen. It wasn't just the usual carping
that surrounds any cinematic conversion of a beloved literary
work. de Sica himself was considered highly problematic. Once
a star of the Italian neo-realist movement, with major achievements
like The Bicycle Thief (1948) and Umberto D (1952), by the 1960s
he had been written off as a lightweight, incapable of anything
more substantial than brittle bedroom farces like Marriage Italian
Style (1964).
Few were prepared, then, for de Sica's brilliant return to form.
His Finzi-Continis, set in the years 1938 to 1943, is an autumnal
work in two senses — the subject is the last golden flash of
freedom before one of history's major tragedies, and it represents
de Sica's final great work (he made three lesser films after
it and died in 1974).
The title refers to the vast, walled grounds adjacent to the
mansion of a family of wealthy, reclusive Jews in Ferrara, Italy,
as Fascism begins to overtake the country. This is a kind of
sacred space of innocence, affluence, and protected pleasure
that safeguards the last of the Finzi-Continis line, Micòl (Dominique
Sanda) and Alberto (Helmut Berger), from the increasingly grim
developments outside. We see them as both youngsters and young
adults in the film's mix of flashbacks and the present.
The Finzi-Continis are admired and envied by the townspeople.
Middle-class Jews like the family of Giorgio (Lino Capolicchio)
can hardly believe they're Jews — perhaps because of their worldliness
and detachment. Giorgio is one of the few invited into the garden
and the mansion, where Micòl and Alberto play tennis, dance,
and listen to Scarlatti and Fats Waller. Giorgio is in love with
Micòl, but she seems capricious, distracted by a variety of amorous
intrigues and a perhaps too-close relationship with her brother.
Alberto appears to be in love with another frequent visitor to
the garden, the ruggedly handsome Malnate (Fabio Testi), who
indulges Alberto's desperate friendship while having an affair
with Micòl.
The film contrasts the seeming frivolity
and indulgences of life at the Finzi-Continis with the methodical
assault on the rights of Ferrara's Jews who live in less sacred
spaces. Giorgio is a gifted scholar, but he's turned out of
school for the "crime" of
Jewishness. One of his friends is taken away, significantly,
in a movie theatre, where the "escapism" of cinema
offers no escape. Just as it provided Giorgio with a romance
(however frustrated) in the form of Micòl, the house of the Finzi-Continis
opens its library so he can continue his studies. But most of
the townspeople are enthusiastic supporters of "Il Duce" and
Giorgio has little chance to survive, much less study and flourish,
unless he leaves. The film gathers its young people for their
pleasures in the garden, then slowly disperses them to their
doom.
de Sica returned to his neo-realist roots here, with only five
of the actors professionals and the rest chosen from amateurs
from Ferrara and elsewhere in Italy. The film was shot on location
in the city in which it's set. On the other hand, the stark black-and-white
of his early work is transformed here into luminous pastels that
capture the fleeting, dreamlike existence of the Finzi-Continis.
The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, recently restored, is a subtle
study of the collapse of the spirit in the face of intolerable
historical forces. For Giorgio, the film's narrator and central
voice, Micòl is an ideal that remains always somehow out of reach,
just as the ideal of the garden remains, to the Finzi-Continis,
their guests, and the viewer, out of reach.
Bright Lights Film Jounnal : www.brightlightsfilm.com March
1997 Issue 18 Garry Morris
Accessed 23/3/2011
to top |
|
