Since I’ve turned Francophile I went to the video shop and hired out a number of French-related films. On a whim I decided to watch Last Tango In Paris, partly to see if it had any good Parisian scenery. Yes, I am that jaded. I also got it because I wanted to watch the famed anal sex scene again, see if it was as shocking as I remembered.
Bertolucci’s 1972 film made waves when it was first released. Journalist Pauline Kael wrote: “This must be the most powerful erotic movie ever made, and it may turn out to be the most liberating movie ever made.” The News of the World called it “the sexiest, frankest picture ever made… the sex film to end all sex films.”
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Watching Bertolucci’s 1972 film is an uncomfortable experience. I would hesitate to call it an erotic film at all. In reality the sex is really quite awful. Brando’s character Paul hasn’t got a lot of respect for the word “no” which means he harrasses, taunts, rapes and stalks Jeanne, the female protagonist played by Maria Schneider. There’s really only once vaguely tender sex scene in the whole film and that occurs near the start, when the casual affair begins. Beyond that, it’s all just… well, nasty.
The film is based on Bertolucci’s own fantasy of meeting a complete stranger in an empty flat for sex without boundaries or commitment. That in itself sounds like a great idea for a porn movie but Last Tango In Paris is actually more about grief, isolation, degradation and death than it is about eroticism or pleasure. As an art film exploring dark human emotion and despair, it’s great. But a sex film, it aint.
The Independent wrote this retrospective on the film last year. I was caught by this paragraph:
It is easy to spot Last Tango’s lasting influence. Whether in the work of Catherine Breillat (Romance, Anatomy of Hell), or in such films as David Mackenzie’s Young Adam and Patrice Chéreau’s Intimacy, Bertolucci has opened the way for film-makers to explore sexuality in a frank and probing fashion without being labelled pornographers.
It’s funny how being labelled a pornographer is the worst thing that could possibly befall a filmmaker.
What’s interesting about the new batch of sex filmmakers listed here is that they all make films where sex isn’t really about pleasure. Films like Romance and Anatomy of Hell are about as sexy as a dead, wet fish; the experience of watching them just as discomforting as Last Tango In Paris.
Bertolucci’s real legacy is that a film featuring real sex (or a lot of it) can’t be taken seriously unless the protagonists are dysfunctional in some way. You can’t make a sex film that is simply about sex, or about enjoying sex within a relationship, because you WILL be labelled a pornographer. And that is a real tragedy because it means that filmmakers like Tony Comstock still don’t have permission from society to stand on a level playing field with those who create “serious” movies featuring graphic sex.
Hi there Ms. Naughty! Long time reader, first time commenter…. that is a very astute observation made about how mainstream filmmakers see sex being represented onscreen in mainstream or indie films, that it seems only exploring in a negative context is worthy of praise or attention. Someone like Comstock does lose out because he is documenting couples in healthy, loving relationships expressing that love in sexually explicit films and yet he can get lumped in with Max Hardcore as a “pornographer” . I am not one to hate on the term “pornographer” itself, but I hate that the connotation most immediately made is that it is prurient and unworthy of mainstream accolades…