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THE WORKS OF TINTO BRASSCapriccio(a.k.a. Love and Passion, 1987)
REVISED NOTES, POSTED ON MONDAY, 11 NOVEMBER 2002:
On my first viewing, nearly a year
ago, I thought the first 15 minutes enchanting,
but the rest of the movie didn’t do much
for me. Well, that’s putting it mildly.
Actually it horrified me. But a second viewing
changed my mind. Brass had wanted to make this film,
from Mario Soldati’s novel,
immediately after The Key, but had to wait
a few years to convince a producer.
Well, maybe not. That’s the story I had somehow pieced together 20+ years ago,
but now I think the story was the reverse.
I think it was Dino De Laurentiis who offered the project to Tinto.
The story,
which I at first thought overly simplistic, is of
Jennifer and Fred, a couple whose marriage is
beginning to fail. A business trip to Capri after
the war reunites them with their previous lovers,
the scary pimp Ciro and the hot-tempered hooker
Rosa. The disillusionment that both Jennifer and
Fred suffer has the unexpected consequence of
renewing their marriage. On my first viewing, my
basic problem was Jennifer’s crush on the
scary Ciro, which I found disturbingly unrealistic.
More specifically, the one scene that turned my
stomach and turned me off to the entire movie was when
Jennifer lured Ciro into attacking her. But when I
watched the film again (Why, you ask? Because I
wanted to write about it), I realized how dumb I
was. All my life I’ve been witnessing
otherwise-intelligent women swooning over dangerously scary
guys — and seeming to enjoy being victims of
violence. For the life of me I’ll never understand
why that is. So okay, the movie is perfectly realistic.
How could I have thought otherwise? Still, though, I
wish that scene had been written differently, without the
sexual violence. Anyway, that aside, Capriccio
beautifully explores the minds of people who are a short
step away from self-understanding. The acting by the four
leads is completely convincing, and Nicola Warren in
particular is superb. (She is obviously a professional
actress, but she has made no other movies, and Google
searches turn up absolutely nothing. Strano!)
The more I think about it, the more beautiful I think
this movie is. (And no, in case you’re wondering,
the sex scene at the end is faked.)
Interesting to see Brass’s daughter Beatrice as Alice the babysitter.
(Is the baby she’s babysitting her real-life son? Is his
name Matteo? The girl watching the parade Brass’s niece Lulù?)
NOTE: Ciro (Cyrus), in addition to
being a personal name, is also the name of the film
splicer invented by famous editor Dott. Leo Catozzo.
The expensive models are the best splicers in the
world, and the inexpensive models are the worst
splicers in the world. I don’t know if that bears
any significance on this film, but just in case it
does, now you know.
TECHNICAL NOTES:
Capriccio was made in English, but every English
copy we have found looks terrible. The only copy we
know of that looks nice, bright, clear, sharp, colorful, and
widescreen (1.66:1) is the Italian dub. Oy.
ANOTHER NOTE: This is the
first of Brass’s films in stereo.
(Caligula doesn’t count, since Tinto was given the boot long before the sound was recorded and mixed.)
YET ANOTHER NOTE: Brass’s
next script was L’uomo che guarda, from
the Alberto Moravia novel, which was scheduled to go
before cameras in late 1986 or early 1987, but was
delayed by seven years. (See Variety, 2 April
1986, p. 42.)
NOTE ADDED ON SUNDAY, 28 MARCH 2010:
I had been wanting to read Soldati’s novel, Le lettere da Capri,
but in the original Italian.
The problem is that until I can live and work for a few months or a year in Italy,
my Italian will never be good enough.
And I can’t manage to move to Italy.
That’s a benefit reserved only for the privileged and/or rich, of which I am neither.
So I finally checked to see if there was an English translation.
There was:
The novel was not at all what I was expecting.
It dealt straight away exclusively with people who are shallow, selfish, deceitful,
manipulative, cunning, two-faced, confused, obsessive, uncaring, psychopathic, self-centered, self-absorbed.
The type of people I hate.
The type of people I hate even to think about.
The type of people whose sexual indiscretions are forever gossiped about around the water cooler in the break room.
Normally I would have thrown the book into the trash bin after a few pages,
but I am at the stage of life where I don’t like to abandon projects anymore.
If I start something, I’ll finish.
So I read it all the way through.
Once I was nearly half-way into it, I couldn’t put it down.
It was absolutely gripping, for it worked in some unexpected surprises,
as these horrid characters, against their will, and without even realizing it,
began to acquire some hints of sanity and perception and caring.
This book, towards the end, becomes genuinely haunting — eerily, disquietingly so.
This book was never made into a movie.
Capriccio bears only the faintest resemblance to Soldati’s book.
Tinto took a few plot elements and wrote his own story based upon them.
He gave everything his own spin.
The half-century-long marriage of Tinto and Tinta was one of the rare successful and happy marriages.
The result of that good fortune is that Tinto became a firm proponent of marriage,
and most of his movies, beginning with The Key,
presented marriage as a panacea to all emotional ills.
Oh, yes, Tinto says, marriage will have its challenges, but challenges are meant to be overcome.
So he transformed Soldati’s tragic,
almost unbearably sad story into a joyous celebration of married life.
There is another element to Soldati’s story,
and I’m not completely certain that even Soldati himself was aware of it, though I suspect he was.
The story’s main protagonist could only be open and honest with another male.
With women he had always to be deceitful.
That lent the book a homosocial overtone that hinted at a repressed homosexual undertone,
which usually wouldn’t bother me in the least,
but in the context of this story it’s downright disturbing.
Tinto eliminated that completely.
In essence, Tinto’s movie was no longer Soldati’s story;
it was his own story, and that surely is why Soldati would not allow
the producers to list him or his book in the credits.
Luigi e Aurelio
De Laurentiis presentano
|
| Operatore alla macchina (cameraman) |
Enrico Sasso |
| Collaborazione al montaggio (assistant editor) |
Fiorenza Müller |
| Montaggio sonoro (sound editor) |
Alessandro “Sandro” Peticca |
| Ufficio stampa (press office) |
Lucherin-Pignatelli |
| Fotografo di scena (still photographer) |
Gianfranco Salis |
| Coordinamento generale (coordination) |
Carla Cipriani |
| Organizzatore amministrativo (accounting manager) |
Mario Sampaolo |
| Organizzatore generale (production manager) |
Mario di Biase |
| Costumi disegnati da (costumes designed by) |
Jost Jakob |
| Costumista (costumer) |
Carolina Ferrara |
| Divise (uniforms) |
Ugo Pericoli |
| Scenografia e arredamento (art director) |
Paolo Biagetti |
| Musica composta e diretta da (music composed and conducted by) |
Riz Ortolani |
| Direttore della fotografia (director of photography) |
Silvano Ippoliti |
| Una produzione | Famous Films Productions n.v. |
| Realizzata da (produced by) |
Giovanni Bertolucci |
| per la (for) |
San Francisco Film S.r.l. |
| Liberamente tratta dal romanzo di (freely adapted from the novel by) |
Mario Soldati, Le lettere da Capri [uncredited] |
| Scritto, diretto e montato da (written, directed, edited by) |
Tinto Brass |
| Aiuto regista (assistant director) |
Sandro Peticca |
| Segretaria di edizione (continuity) |
Carla Cipriani |
| Parrucchiera (hair dresser) |
Iole Cecchini |
| Truccatore (make-up) |
Fabrizio Sforza |
| Coreografo (c[h]oreographer) |
Giuseppe Pennese |
| Primo assistente operatore (first assistant cameraman) |
Ettore Corso |
| Assistente al montaggio (second assistant editor) |
Giovanna Ritter |
| Arredatore (set dresser) |
Maurizio Garrone |
| Fonico di presa diretta (sound) |
Amedeo Casati |
| Ispettori di produzione (unit managers) |
Massimo Ferrero, Roberto De Laurentiis |
| Assistente scenografo (assistant art director) |
Emita Frigato |
| Capo elettricista (gaffer) |
Sergio Spila |
| Capo macchinista (key grip) |
Giancarlo Rocchetti |
| Attrezzisti (property masters) |
Roberto Magagnini, Marco e Luca Mazzieri |
| Effetti speciali (special effects) |
Franco Celli |
| Maestro d’armi (stuntman) |
Giorgio Ricci |
| Microfonista (boom man) |
Alfredo Petti |
| Assistente truccatore (assistant make-up) |
Antonio Maltempo |
| Assistente operatore (second assistant cameraman) |
Gino Conversi |
| Assistenti alla regia (second assistant directors) |
Emanuela Lucidi, Massimo Arcalli |
| Dialogue coach | Stefania Amfitheatrof |
| Assistenti costumisti (assistant costumers) |
Simonetta Mattei, Fulvia Amendolia |
| Sarta (wardrober) |
Franca Paoletti |
| Pittore (set painter) |
Otello Tiberi |
| Aiuti al montaggio (third assistant editors) |
Giorgio Peticca, Cristina Serangeli |
| Elettricisti (best boys) |
Marcello Cardarelli, Franco Cardarelli, Franco Gubiotti |
| Macchinisti (grips) |
Massimo Galiano, Mario Occhioni, Riccardo Ferrero |
| Cassiere (paymasters) |
Dorina Mari, Alessandra Sampaolo |
| Segretari di produzione (production secretaries) |
Francesca Andriotto, Mauro Babini, Andrea Mattei |
| Edizione italiana a cura di (Italian edition) |
Gruppo Trenta |
| Assistente al doppiaggio (assistant dubber) |
Monica Simonetti |
| Fonico di doppiaggio (dubbing recording) |
Adriano Torbidone |
| Esterni (locations) |
Capri, Amalfi, Atrani, Caserta, Tarquinia, Soriano, Caprarola, Vicarello |
| Teatri di posa (interiors filmed at) |
De Paolis, Roma |
| Negativi (negatives) |
Kodak spa |
| Sviluppo e stampa (processed by) |
Technicolor spa |
| Postsincronizzazione (postsynchronization) |
Cinecittà spa |
| Missaggio (sound mixers) |
Fausto Ancillai e Danilo Sterbini |
| Titoli e truke (titles and opticals) |
Studio 4 |
| Sartoria (wardrobe supplied by) |
Russo Costumi d’Arte srl Neriteatromoda srl |
| Calzature (shoes) |
L.C.P. srl |
| Parrucche (wigs) |
Rocchetti-Carboni |
| Tappezzerie (textiles) |
Schiavi Bruno |
| Arredamento (set dressing) |
D’Alfonso-Dedalo G.R.P.-Latour |
| Mezzi tecnici (technical equipment) |
CineNoleggio |
| Trasporti (transportation) |
Romana Trasporti Cinematografici srl |
| Musiche di repertorio (songs) |
ROSAMUNDA di Nise - Vejvoda ed. Leonardi-Milano BUONASERA SIGNORINA di Sigman - De Rose ed. R.C.A. NANNÌ di F. Silvestri ed. Abramo Allione Edizioni Musicali TAMMURIATA NERA di E. A. Mario - E. Nicolardi edizione musicale eseguita dalla Nuova Compagnia di Canto Popolare supervisione artistica di Roberto de Simone disco EMI Italiana |
| Dolby stereo sound consultant | Federico Savina |
| Dolby Stereo in selected theatres |
| PERSONAGGI E INTERPRETI | |
| Jennifer | Nicola Warren (doppiata in italiano da Roberta Paladini) |
| Rosa | Francesca Dellera (dubbed in English by Pat Starke) (doppiata in italiano da Giuppi Izzo) |
| Fred | Andy J. Forrest (doppiato in italiano da Tonino Accolla) |
| Ciro | Luigi Laezza (doppiato in italiano da Claudio Sorrentino) |
| Telephone operator (voice) | Gisella Mathews (English version) |
| ??? | Isabella Biagini |
| Signor Alfredo | Venantino Venantini |
| Diomira |
Dodi Moscati (dubbed in English by Gisella Mathews) |
| Sergeĭ | Osiride Pevarello (dubbed in English by Ted Rusoff) |
| ??? | Josephine Van As |
| Alice | Bea [Beatrice Brass] |
| Hotel Owner’s Young Niece | Lulù |
| Duccio | Matteo |
| Don Vincenzo | Vittorio Caprioli |
| ??? | Camillo Marino |
| ??? | Enzo Turrin |
| ??? | Simona Tedeschi |
| ??? | Laila Peloso |
| Alfio the barber | Armando Marra (dubbed in English by Ted Rusoff???) |
| Waitress??? | Luciana Cirenei |
| ??? | Jean René Lemoine |
| ??? | Cheryl Lee Buchanan |
| ??? | Maria Rosaria Virgili |
| Waiter | Eolo Capritti |
| Older American Officer | Robert Sommer |
| ??? | Umberto Conte |
| Gaston de Coligny | Lionello Pio Di Savoia [uncredited] |
| Clark Gable | Giuseppe Pennese (dubbed in English by Ted Rusoff) |
| ??? | Paolo Pigozzi |
| Hotel Owner | Tinta Brass (Carla Cipriani) [uncredited] |
| Rosa’s Client | Tinto Brass [uncredited] |
