La rabbia di Pasolini

In 1963, Pasolini was invited to make a film using a collection of newsreels. He set to work, but was derailed when the producer made the unwelcome decision to link Pasolini's film with one by the ultra-right-wing journalist Giovanni Guareschi, Pasolini's political opposite. The result, La rabbia, was an unhappy marriage, and failed at the box office. Forty-five years later, Giuseppe Bertolucci undertook to reconstruct that abandoned film. His controversial simulation is presented here followed by a revelation, Pasolini's episode of La rabbia. Unseen since its release, Pasolini's film essay, constructed from newsreel footage accompanied by poetic and political commentary, reveals his radical view of history. He begins by asking, “Why are our lives dominated by discontent?” The film's response centers on social and political conflicts, venturing from Cuba, Congo, and India to a Fiat plant and an atomic blast, while also encompassing Sophia Loren and Marilyn Monroe. Pasolini champions freedom, revolutionary and class struggle, and, finally, the larger view, looking back from space.

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