Synopsis:
The film is divided into three episodes in which the central one occupies most of the film's minutage. In the first episode, La Masque, is told the short story of a certain Mr. Grandval who, drunk at a party altolocata, has a sudden illness and falls to the ground. Later he is taken to a secluded room where he is taken off the mask he was wearing and was suffocating him, then finally is accompanied home. Then opens the second episode with Mme Tellier, widow owner of a brothel, Maison Tellier (hence the title), where she and her girls can pretend to be aristocratic in a seemingly mundane environment, but that essentially remains a mere house of pleasure. Mme Tellier is authoritarian, as evidenced by her reactions towards people she does not know, especially men. Then she goes to her brother's request at the campaign where she must attend the first communion of her granddaughter. In that pleasant, calm and silent place, Mme Tellier and the girls remember their past and their lost innocence, before returning to daily life in the city, where they escaped from the restrictions and nostalgic melancholy through the satisfaction of their pleasure needs. Finally, the last episode, Le Modèle, a young artist becomes infatuating with a woman who becomes his muse, sweetening her with kind words that, however, wither under the mantle of monotony that covers their relationship, now marked as habit. For this reason the artist becomes more and more grumpy and distant towards the woman, to the point that she wants to marry with another. Delegated the task to a friend to report the woman his intentions, she distraught finds him and threatens suicide. To the aggressive and uncaring response of man, she then throws himself out of the window, remaining paraplegic but eventually obtaining his love, aware of his misteake and willing to remedy it.
Comment:
The pleasure is presented here through the stories intertwined by this thread, as a difficult achievement, something that, to be obtained, needs the loss of something else: M. Grandval renounce to his own self, his identity (disguising himself behind the mask which is also a character, only apparent), using alcohol and feasts as means. Mme Tellier, on the other hand, renounce the past and her lost innocence, obtaining pleasure with sexual fulfillment and the wrong dignified status she creates (similarly Mme Rosa, with the difference that she satisfies herself by making men falling in love, in some way marking and illudating them, as happens with the brother of Mme Tellier). Finally, the artist renounces his own freedom and, yielding to his own morality, satisfies his own pleasure by doing what is right to him, even renouncing his own dreams (in parallel, his girlfriend renounces her own health to satisfy herself with the achievement of pure love), which converts in love for the girl and will of redemption. These are three stories with a happy ending that conceal a profound drama, also because the narrator, breaking the 4th wall and communicating with the viewer literally, introduces the various episodes linking pleasure to love, purity and death (moral). The theme is expressed almost as an alchemic principle of equivalent exchange, the fun is to forget its regrets, its own sufferings and nostalgia, which constitute an integral part in obtaining pleasure, a troubled path dismayed of renounce to his own dignity and his own possibilities, as well as dreams. The film anticipates fellinian "La Dolce Vita" without having the intention to exhibit a profound critique, but to focus on the characters and what they feel, also fact that will influence extremely, especially the two episodes La Masque and Maison Tellier, the kubrickian masterpiece "Eyes Wide Shut" in the themes, in the means, in the symbols used to expose them (for example the mask) and also in the direction, characterized by magnificent long shots revolving around the actors (masterfully expressed in both films). A movie that interacts with the person who looks in a friendly, carefree but refined and elegant manner, at times philosophical.
The film is divided into three episodes in which the central one occupies most of the film's minutage. In the first episode, La Masque, is told the short story of a certain Mr. Grandval who, drunk at a party altolocata, has a sudden illness and falls to the ground. Later he is taken to a secluded room where he is taken off the mask he was wearing and was suffocating him, then finally is accompanied home. Then opens the second episode with Mme Tellier, widow owner of a brothel, Maison Tellier (hence the title), where she and her girls can pretend to be aristocratic in a seemingly mundane environment, but that essentially remains a mere house of pleasure. Mme Tellier is authoritarian, as evidenced by her reactions towards people she does not know, especially men. Then she goes to her brother's request at the campaign where she must attend the first communion of her granddaughter. In that pleasant, calm and silent place, Mme Tellier and the girls remember their past and their lost innocence, before returning to daily life in the city, where they escaped from the restrictions and nostalgic melancholy through the satisfaction of their pleasure needs. Finally, the last episode, Le Modèle, a young artist becomes infatuating with a woman who becomes his muse, sweetening her with kind words that, however, wither under the mantle of monotony that covers their relationship, now marked as habit. For this reason the artist becomes more and more grumpy and distant towards the woman, to the point that she wants to marry with another. Delegated the task to a friend to report the woman his intentions, she distraught finds him and threatens suicide. To the aggressive and uncaring response of man, she then throws himself out of the window, remaining paraplegic but eventually obtaining his love, aware of his misteake and willing to remedy it.
Comment:
The pleasure is presented here through the stories intertwined by this thread, as a difficult achievement, something that, to be obtained, needs the loss of something else: M. Grandval renounce to his own self, his identity (disguising himself behind the mask which is also a character, only apparent), using alcohol and feasts as means. Mme Tellier, on the other hand, renounce the past and her lost innocence, obtaining pleasure with sexual fulfillment and the wrong dignified status she creates (similarly Mme Rosa, with the difference that she satisfies herself by making men falling in love, in some way marking and illudating them, as happens with the brother of Mme Tellier). Finally, the artist renounces his own freedom and, yielding to his own morality, satisfies his own pleasure by doing what is right to him, even renouncing his own dreams (in parallel, his girlfriend renounces her own health to satisfy herself with the achievement of pure love), which converts in love for the girl and will of redemption. These are three stories with a happy ending that conceal a profound drama, also because the narrator, breaking the 4th wall and communicating with the viewer literally, introduces the various episodes linking pleasure to love, purity and death (moral). The theme is expressed almost as an alchemic principle of equivalent exchange, the fun is to forget its regrets, its own sufferings and nostalgia, which constitute an integral part in obtaining pleasure, a troubled path dismayed of renounce to his own dignity and his own possibilities, as well as dreams. The film anticipates fellinian "La Dolce Vita" without having the intention to exhibit a profound critique, but to focus on the characters and what they feel, also fact that will influence extremely, especially the two episodes La Masque and Maison Tellier, the kubrickian masterpiece "Eyes Wide Shut" in the themes, in the means, in the symbols used to expose them (for example the mask) and also in the direction, characterized by magnificent long shots revolving around the actors (masterfully expressed in both films). A movie that interacts with the person who looks in a friendly, carefree but refined and elegant manner, at times philosophical.