InRO Weekly — Volume 1, Issue 1

father, Antonio (Giuseppe Addobbati), stands out for its
modernist harshness — and contrasts the latter with
middle-class drawing rooms and the bohemian cafés of Paris.
It's noteworthy that The Conformist still manages to shock with
its depictions of sexual pathology, given that, aside from Salò,
the era also saw the release of Tinto Brass's 1976
proto-Nazisploitation erotic drama Salon Kitty and Luchino
Visconti's sexually frank 1969 film, The Damned. Bertolucci would
further explore themes of sexuality with the controversial Last
Tango in Paris, but with The Conformist, he opted explicitly to link
sexual repression with the ideology of fascism. Far from the first
(or last) work to do so, the film's take nevertheless proves
uniquely tragic, as the story not only highlights the depths of its
main character's pathetic ennui, but also the crushing futility of
human action: in spite of his best efforts, Marcello's obsessive
conformism proves to be in vain when Mussolini resigns as head
of state and the rubble-filled streets are overrun by celebrating
anti-fascists. Worse, he learns that perhaps the most pivotal
moment of his life, his supposed murder of childhood abuser
Lino (Pierre Clémenti), didn't actually happen as he thought it did,
as he finds Lino, now balding and gray, sitting in a dark alley,
again attempting to seduce a young boy.
Marcello isn't the only one who lives his life in the shadow of
sexual abuse, though. On the train to Paris, his wife Giulia
(Stefania Sandrelli) relays a story of how she lost her virginity at
15 to a 60-year-old family friend — a man she used to call uncle.
Aroused, Marcello begins undressing her while asking whether or
not she liked the encounter. The score swells romantically as the
couple are consumed by the lust her memory has roused in them,
the warm, red sky outside paradoxically transforming into a
muted, cool blue. The film also hints at some element of
impropriety in the relationship between Marcello and his
morphine-addicted mother (Carla Mignone, better known by her
stage name Milly), although Bertolucci wouldn't explore the
subject of mother-son incest in depth until 1979's La Luna, a
drama that Soviet filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky described as
"monstrous, cheap, vulgar rubbish" in a diary entry.
“… functions as a kind of
Gesamtkunstwerk: image,
sound, editing, script, and
performance all combine into
something transcendently
cinematic.
In spite of its grave subject matter, The Conformist manages to
portray both the dark and light sides of passive conformity, such
as when a meeting between Marcello and a high-ranking member
of the secret police concludes with Marcello absentmindedly
pointing a gun at his superior before nonchalantly noticing that
he must have misplaced his fedora. Similarly, the form bounces
from uninterrupted camera glides to the skewed, claustrophobic
angles of film noir, and by the time the fascist henchmen emerge
like specters from the foggy woods to dispose of the
troublesome Quadris, the ensuing burst of violence — not to
mention the sheer terror in Anna's eyes as she realizes Marcello's
betrayal — as refracted in the titular conformist's detached gaze,
scans as nothing short of sociopathic. His conscience has been
extinguished by his desire to fit in, an utterly pointless
transformation as he will come to realize just a few years later
when the end of the Duce's reign is announced on the radio. And
when he finally sits down during the final moments, he fixes his
eyes on the audience; his guilt, regret, and confusion becoming
truly tangible for the first (and last) time. — FRED BARRETT
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