An entire day of works paying homage to filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini (1922–1975) on the 100th anniversary of his birth will be shown at the Castro Theatre on Saturday, September 10, 2022. Pasolini 100: Homage to Pier Paolo Pasolini will follow the complete retrospective that Cinecittà premiered earlier this year at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles. Pasolini, who was also a noted poet, novelist, journalist, Marxist, and openly gay man, passionately fought against government corruption, materialism, and social repression.
The son of a Fascist army officer, Pasolini produced films that examine the Fascist experiment in Italy, the fervor of nationalism, and the disdain of the rich for the poor. His films often spotlight the lives of Italy’s working poor, including everyday citizens as well as sex workers.
Pasolini’s early literary works attempted to resolve his Christian and Marxist ideologies. His first novel, Ragazzi di Vita (1955), on which his film Accattone is loosely based, featured a protagonist who is a young street hustler. The book caused obscenity charges to be filed against Pasolini, the first of many instances in which his art led him to interact with the legal system.
A prominent player in the post WWII cultural scene in Rome, Pasolini was part of a coterie of talented artists, including writer Alberto Moravia, writer Elsa Morante, and opera star Maria Callas, whom he cast in her only film appearance in Medea. His decision, long before the modern LGBTQ rights movement, to make his own homosexuality the subject of his poetry and novels was, at the time, scandalous.
CinemaItaliaSF will present a range of his work, from the sublime to the difficult, in the spirit of the freedom of expression that Pasolini passionately espoused. The Homage serendipitously coincides with the 100th anniversary of the Castro Theatre.
“Though he was a filmmaker for just over a decade, Pasolini’s impact on cinema is profound,” shared B. Rondeau, Senior Director of Film Programs at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. “An openly gay man and outspoken critic of capitalism and Europe’s bourgeois establishment, Pasolini remained in the crosshairs of the elite for his entire career, which ended tragically when he was murdered weeks before the premiere of his most incendiary condemnation of the upper classes: Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom. He was 53 years old.”
“Presented almost in preserved 35mm prints, realized by Cinecittà and Cineteca di Bologna, this small selection of movies traverses Pasolini’s main periods: his reinvention of Italian neorealism as a potently lyrical vehicle for devastating portraits of modern life (Accattone, Mamma Roma); his searing portraits of the depravity of European society and his shocking one-two punch of the celebratory Trilogy of Life, a celebration of the primal pleasures of sex set in antiquity, and its antithesis, the devastatingly bleak World War II horror show Salò.”
The schedule includes:
10:30 am – Pasolini, about the filmmaker’s mysterious final days;12:30 pm – Mamma Roma, Pasolini’s second feature and starring Anna Magnani;
3 pm – Accattone, Pasolini’s first feature, regarded as one of cinema’s great debuts;
6 pm – Medea, starring Maria Callas in a rare non-operatic role;
8 pm–10 pm – La Roma di Pasolini Mezzanine Reception, where Rudy of C’era una Volta restaurant will create a Roman atmosphere for selected guests in the Castro Mezzanine;
10 pm – Salò, Pasolini’s infamous final film.
For more information and to purchase tickets: https://tinyurl.com/yanpyrey
Published on August 25, 2022
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