Reverse Shot [III]: ‘Exterior Night’ (Marco Bellocchio, 2022)

Third entry of a three-part text on Marco Bellocchio’s mini-series ‘Exterior Night’, where the director returns to a crucial episode in Italian history that he had already tackled in his masterpiece ‘Good Morning, Night’ (2003): the 1978 kidnapping of Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades. This entry explores the religious themes of Christ and the Passion, as well as self-referentiality and the double/alternative endings.

Reverse Shot [II]: ‘Exterior Night’ (Marco Bellocchio, 2022)

Second entry of a three-part text on Marco Bellocchio’s mini-series ‘Exterior Night’, where the director returns to a crucial episode in Italian history that he had already tackled in his masterpiece ‘Good Morning, Night’ (2003): the 1978 kidnapping of Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades. This entry explores the intersection between history, politics, and psyche (paying special attention to fantasies, dreams, symbols, and Cossiga's psychic breakdown); and traces the different ramifications of the presentation of Moro as a father figure.

Reverse Shot [I]: ‘Exterior Night’ (Marco Bellocchio, 2022)

First entry of a three-part text on Marco Bellocchio’s mini-series ‘Exterior Night’, where the director returns to a crucial episode in Italian history that he had already tackled in his masterpiece ‘Good Morning, Night’ (2003): the 1978 kidnapping of Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades. This entry explores the kaleidoscopic construction and narrative strategies of the series, as well as the themes of rhetoric and the Eros Principle.

To The Girl Of Eighteen

Some passages from Irene Claremont de Castillejo's 'Knowing Woman: A Feminine Psychology', some images from Philippe Garrel's 'The Phantom Heart', and a few memories of myself at eighteen. A collage on the themes of love, hate, and indifference—and the blossoming of unique relationships.

The Bear Attack and the Talking Fish [II]: ‘Siberia’ (Abel Ferrara, 2020)

In my previous text I discussed the bear attack happening early in the film; here, I'll concentrate on the last scene of 'Siberia' with the talking fish. It is highly significant that, at the end of the film, Clint finds his post destroyed. The storm of fantasies that is 'Siberia' has knocked down the walls of Clint's refuge; his psyche is raw, tender, naked and exposed. The defenses to which he clung in order to keep the unconscious at bay have been severely weakened...

The Bear Attack and the Talking Fish [I]: ‘Siberia’ (Abel Ferrara, 2020)

There are only a few episodes in 'Siberia' that can be unmistakably traced to Jung's 'The Red Book' (its source of inspiration). Neither the scene with the bear, nor the scene with the fish, are among them. But, since everybody seems to agree that 'Siberia' is a trip to the unconscious—and since the unconscious speaks in symbolic language—I'll attempt here a psychological interpretation of these two scenes (influenced by Jung's discussion on symbols and archetypes), while offering a close analysis of their filmic form.

Blood Ties: My Most Wicked Childhood Act

Once, I told my brother that he was adopted. I might have been around 12 or 13—my brother being three years younger than me. During that time, I was facing an important quandary in my life: I wanted to become an actress, but this is something I never dared to express aloud. There were two things that stood in my way and that I couldn't overcome—two things that made of my wish a secret that I was even ashamed to entertain...

‘As Tears Go By…’: Marianne Faithfull & Anna Karina

In this audiovisual essay, Anna Karina and Marianne Faithfull talk to themselves and to each other across six different films. Bitterly, blatantly, brutally: they muse—using words written by men and songs composed by men—on what it means (for all of us: there ain't escape from the culture) to perform, inside and outside the fiction, as women invented by men...

That Cube Caught My Fantasy…

Some months ago, I found in YouTube this wonderful video of Carl Gustav Jung at his Bollingen Tower. The footage prominently features a stone that he carved and put in his garden, next to the lake, as an offering for his 75th birthday. Following the trail of two sets of image-associations, this essay goes from Telesphoros (the bewitching figure carved in one of the sides of the stone) to Nicolas Roeg's 'Don't Look Now' and Krzysztof Kieślowski's 'Dekalog I'.

Dreams I Don’t Have

A few years ago, I read C. G. Jung's autobiography, 'Memories, Dreams, Reflections'. At that time, I was purposefully trying to remember my dreams. Instead of just fantasising myself into oblivion (which is my most natural attitude when I go to bed), I attempted to get into a state of receptiveness and relaxed attention (quite an endeavour for a person like me!). I don't know how I came up with this idea: I guess it seemed more respectful with the unconscious than just trying to control every thought by driving it exactingly where I wanted it to be...

‘Birth’

This is the first film I've made using, entirely, digital superimpositions. I guess you could say that this is a film about my birth. My mother told me once that my father became another person the moment I was born. I believe her because, if I try to remember a time when I might have felt any connection with my father, I can't: it's as if there was never any. I've heard details about that period before, but I've never had a full-on narration by her to which I could re-listen...

Reveal Thyself

The first essay in James Hillman's 'The Myth of Analysis' is titled "Psychological Creativity". It explores the myth of Eros and Psyche as the main archetypal structure that is experienced and re-enacted by therapeutic analysis—in fact, experienced and re-enacted by any close relationship (between and within each person) where soul-making is involved...

Nothing

I've met people who weren't depressed, yet wouldn't detect a strand of humour even if it was showed right up their asses. That's just to say, by way of introduction, that I am not, in fact, surprised that depression is associated so often with some sort of nihilism on account of the nothing to which the depressed clings. Because the depressed—above all—clings. She clings onto nothing and the nothings she feels, and sees, and utters, seem completely incomprehensible to anybody else...

Brain Massage

Usually, I would have cringed in disbelief and horror at the mere suggestion of a vague link between "what I feel" and the state of the world at large. (It's a long story, but to make it short: if you've lived feeling acutely the separation between you and others, between you and a world without a place for you, this idea just does not make much sense; in fact, this idea is deeply offensive.) I've learnt that this belief in the separation between oneself and the world is a quite common delusion. But knowing I am delusional doesn't stop me feeling how I feel...

The Long Road: ‘Liberté et Patrie’ (Jean-Luc Godard & Anne-Marie Miéville, 2002)

The 'and' functions to always carry the links forward—but it also operates across each pair ("freedom and fatherland, fatherland and freedom": the visual and aural back-and-forth is a constant in the film). It's the movement effected by the 'and' that frees the terms from themselves, and frees the pairs from themselves—threading relations that multiply and amplify, that give substance, background and meaning, that constellate a veritable cosmos out of those two initial notions...

F

In 2009, I became fascinated by a young man – I'll call him F – who lived in the streets and used to beg for money near my workplace. The year before, I had walked past him several times. There was a group of about ten people – mostly Eastern-European women – who used to line up at the front and back doors of a cathedral, asking for money from the visitors (sometimes, also stealing wallets via tricks that were so crude I could not believe tourists let themselves be fooled so easily). Amongst these people was F, whose looks and manners were different...

The Outline: Milner/Watkins/Munch

A word/image collage on the outline. With quotes by Marion Milner, Peter Watkins, and Edvard Munch...

Motion, Propagation, Transmission: ‘Devil in the Flesh’ (Marco Bellocchio, 1986)

Marco Bellocchio’s 'Devil in the Flesh' starts with a shot of several, interconnected buildings: a high-angle view encompassing the three areas where the action of the eight-minute opening sequence will take place. He draws a precise diagram of the struggle at the centre of the film: madness, besieged on all sides by two institutions – church and school (a third, psychiatry, will make an appearance later) – that are both seduced and horrified by its manifestation...

Back with a Vengeance?: ‘Phoenix’ (Christian Petzold, 2014)

Petzold has a special knack for punchy, surprising endings. The final minutes of 'Phoenix' are a great proof of this. However, when I saw the film for the first time, its ending left me with a strange feeling. In a way, it provided a perfectly coherent closure. But, paradoxically, as the protagonist morphed into a blur and exited the frame, I also felt as if the movie had yet to begin. I want to stay with this first impression for a moment – because I think it says a lot about how our expectations can condition what we see and hear on screen...

If versus Despite: ‘Sweet Dreams’ (Marco Bellocchio, 2016)

In Marco Bellocchio's 'Sweet Dreams', there's a scene in which the teenage hero, Massimo, is questioned by his teacher, Father Ettore, about why he keeps telling his friends that his mother is alive when, in reality, she's been dead for several years. "If she were still here … ", says the kid. "If, if … 'If' is the mark of failure. In this life, it’s 'despite' that makes you succeed", responds the Father...