Liliana Cavani Movies

The Teatro Alla Scalla mounted this 2008 production of Giuseppe Verdi's 1853 opera Traviata, directed by the eminent Liliana Cavani (The Night Porter) and starring Angela Gheorghiu, Roberto Frontali, Ramón Vargas and Natascha Petrinsky. The Orchestra, Chorus and Ballet of the Teatro Alla Scala provide added accompaniment under the baton of Lorin Maazel. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

The cool and mannered sociopath Tom Ripley returns to the big screen in director Liliana Cavani's 2002 crime thriller Ripley's Game, adapted from the 1974 novel by Patricia Highsmith. Living a life of luxury as an art dealer in northern Italy with his musician wife Luisa (Chiara Caselli), Ripley (John Malkovich) attends a party thrown by Jonathan Trevanny (Dougray Scott) and overhears the host making critical comments about Ripley's fashion sense. Enraged, Ripley immediately plots his retaliation for this slight, which comes via a reunion with his former business partner Reeves (Ray Winstone). Reeves seeks out Ripley's help in finding an unrecognized assassin to kill a Russian gangster, and Ripley suggests he talk to Trevanny -- whom Ripley knows has recently been diagnosed with leukemia and is also desperately strapped for cash. Trevanny reluctantly accepts the offer, in order to insure his family's security -- but is pressured into a repeat performance, which draws the ire of Ripley. The situation quickly spirals out of control to the point of drawing the attention -- and anger -- of the Russian mob, forcing Ripley to intervene. But the master criminal also develops a respect for his unwitting victim, forming an unlikely friendship under the most dire of circumstances. ~ Ryan Shriver, All Movie Guide

Fausto (Gaetano Carotenuto) is a deaf boy who has been trained from birth to live exclusively in the hearing world. His mother (Anna Bonaiuto) has refused to allow him to meet or interact with other deaf children, much less learn sign language. As a consequence, he gets along (with some difficulties) in the hearing world; he holds a job at a bank, and has a "normal" girlfriend. His mother cannot or will not see that despite his "success," Fausto still feels like a second-class citizen since he will always be somewhat disadvantaged among the hearing. His spirits are boosted when he meets a girl (Chiara Caselli) who has dropped out of school; he is able to persuade her to return to school, and he is able to persuade the school board that she knows enough to sit for her final exams with her classmates. Eventually this sense of accomplishment enables him to win a victory of his own over his iron-willed mother. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

In 1938 Berlin, Gudrun Landgrebe, wife of Nazi functionary Kevin McNally, begins taking art lessons. She makes the acquaintance of another student, Japanese ambassador's daughter Mio Takaki. Soon afterwards, the two women begin a passionate lesbian affair. This leads to a chain reaction of disaster and tragedy, culminating with the inevitable intervention of the Gestapo. Despite the film's galloping sexual passions, The Berlin Affair is an exercise in aloofness, keeping the characters at arm's length-surprising, considering that the director was Liliana Cavani, auteur of the erotic classic The Night Porter (1974). The film was based on The Buddhist Cross, a novel by Junichiro Tanizaki. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Italian La Pelle was released in English-speaking countries as The Skin. Set in the twilight of World War 2, the film is a compendium of bitter recollections concerning the Allied liberation of Naples. These memories were originally bundled together in book form by Curzio Malaparte, played herein by Marcello Mastroianni. If you've gathered that the tone of the film is anti-American, you're not far off base: it's too bad that cowriter/director Liliana Cavani was more interested in her agenda than in entertaining the audience. The best performance is rendered by Burt Lancaster as General Mark Clark. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Max (Dirk Bogarde) is a discreet, unassuming night porter working in a posh hotel in Vienna in 1957, tending to the guests' needs, from cold water to a bed-warming gigolo. Then Lucia (Charlotte Rampling) arrives at the hotel, on the arm of her husband, an American composer, and Max's past comes flooding back to him. It turns out Max was an S.S. officer at a Nazi concentration camp where Lucia was a beautiful young prisoner. She became, in effect, Max's sexual slave. Now, years later, their reunion shatters both of their lives. Lucia stays in Vienna after her husband travels on, in order to see Max, and they find themselves caught up in a renewal of their former sadomasochistic relationship. Max has an upcoming show trial for his war crimes. His former S.S. comrades have been carefully destroying documents and "filing away" witnesses to clear all their names, and, while Max tries to keep Lucia's existence a secret from them, they eventually find out about her. They consider her a threat, and they urge Max to turn her over to them. He quits his job, and he and Lucia hide out in his apartment, while his former friends keep watch. Liliana Cavani (Ripley's Game) co-wrote and directed this controversial film, Il Portiere di Notte, which she reportedly based partly on her own interviews with a Holocaust survivor. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide

L'Ospite is a psychological melodrama about a family whose self-deception is revealed when a stranger intrudes. A middle-aged woman introduces her lover to her children, who are about the same age. The reaction of the daughter (the main character) turns the potentially comic situation into a real psychodrama. Her awkward behavior arises out of her inability to accept a reality that is different from the one she's always lived in. As if one trauma is not enough, she also discovers her father is a homosexual. The roles are now reversed; it is the parents who transgress and feel shame, and the daughter who has bourgeois mores and is worried about the family's reputation. Alessandro Colizzi uses a cold, detached tone to expose the contradictions and limitations of certain sections of the cultured and well-to-do left-wing Italian middle class. The title of the film is translated into English as "The Guest," but in Italian it indicates the host and the guest, rendering an ambiguity as to who is the guest/host, which seems to suit the purpose of the director. The film is made in the tradition of Pasolini and Visconti, although Colizzi cites Fassbinder as his influence. L'Ospite was screened as part of the International Forum of New Cinema section of the 49th Berlin Film Festival, 1999. -- ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide

Somewhat overshadowed by Joseph Losey's 1975 film on the same subject, the 1968 Italian/Bulgarian biopic Galileo is a worthwhile picture in its own right. Irish stage and screen actor Cyril Cusack is well-cast as Galileo Galilei, famed astronomer and unintentional icon-buster. Stirring up controversy with his theory that the Earth is not the center of the Universe, Galileo is given a going-over by the Vatican legal system. The highlight: "Nevertheless, it does move!" A bit too verbose in its climactic courtroom scenes, Galileo nonetheless does full justice to its protagonist. The musical score is by Ennio Morricone, of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly fame. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide