The Decameron

Rating:
Summary: Pure, magic art!
Review: "The Decameron" is the first film inPier Paolo Pasolini's "Trilogy of Life",and this is pure,magic art! This film,based on Boccaccio's tales of medeivalmagic,violence,and eros,is probablyPasolini's most accessible,purelyenjoyable film!

Rating:
Summary: Pretentious
Review: Although I am generally a proponet of the well-made film, I do not limit myself to films which escape those boundaries, and more often than not I do enjoy and admire films that successfully "break the rules." And it is quite true that director Pasolini breaks the rules of established cinema. But it is also my opinion that he does not break them successfully or to any actual point.

Pasolini's work is visually jarring, but this is less a matter of what is actually on the screen than how it is filmed, and the jumpiness of his films seem less a matter of artistic choice than the result of amateur cinematography. This is true of DECAMERON. Pasolini often prefered to use non-actors, and while many directors have done so with remarkable result, under Pasolini's direction his non-actors tend to remain non-actors. This is also true of DECAMERON. Pasolini quite often includes images designed to shock, offend, or otherwise disconcert the audience. Such elements can often be used with startling effect, but in Pasolini's hands such elements seldom seem to actually contribute anything to the film. This is also true of DECAMERON.

I have been given to understand there are many people who like, even admire Pasolini's films. Even so, I have never actually met any of them, and I have never been able to read anything about Pasolini or his works that made the reason for such liking or admiration comprehensible to me. Judging him from his works alone, I am of the opinion that he was essentially an amateurish director who did not "break the rules" so much by choice as by lack of skill--and who was initially applauded by the intelligentsia of his day for " existential boldness," thereby simply confirming him in bad habits as a film maker. I find his work tedious, unimpressive, and pretentious. And this, too, is true of DECAMERON. It is also, sadly, true of virtually every Pasolini film it has been my misfortune to endure.

Rating:
Summary: This is a bad edition of Pasolini's magnificent film
Review: Boccacio's Decameron consisted of ten realistic stories told by travelers during the plague. Pasolini tied them together and reframed them within the theme of art-does-not-imitate-life. This DVD cut out some scenes essential for understanding the film (e.g., dinner with water melons in the first story, The Invitation), and sanitized certain erotic ones (e.g., Mute Gardener). It is also a pity that the stories have been edited back-to-back without breaks or subtitles so that the viewer not familiar with the original is left guessing where one story ends and another begins. But the greatest injustice to Pasolini is in cutting out most of the final scene that ties all the stories together and gives them a meaning. In that scene real-life thieves, pedophiles, grave-robbers, murderers, adulterers, con artists, and blasphemers - the stories' characters - are shown depicted on cathedral frescos as saints, angels, and archangels by the starry-eyed painter. At the very least, the buyer should be warned that this DVD is an abridged version of the original, and that its editors took poetic licence with it.

Rating:
Summary: THIS IS FROM PASSOLINE
Review: Dont lost time by or if have time see this DVD is from PASSOLINE not have comentary You need by foe see!!!

Rating:
Summary: 8, 10, whatever...
Review: It is very odd that we can just lose parts of films into the ether. People who have nobley gone out and done their research, seeking out Passollini with a sincere curiosity are being rewarded with a misleading, partial work, presented as the whole. Is this the work of the prudish puritans, insensitive capitalists or a natural disaster? Who knows.

What we do know is that the DECAMERON was clearly based on the number ten, not eight. Ten stories, as the original book has ten narrators, each telling ten stories. Passollinni even divided the film up three and seven to relflect the three men and seven women who told the stories in the book. Important? Maybe not.

What is significant is that part of the movie is missing! and Passollini's statement, and of course he was making a statement, is incomplete.

Rating:
Summary: Was Pasolini Really Necessary?
Review: Like most of Pasolini's self-indulgent, grotesque, largely pointless, and badly made films, virtually any five minutes of The Decameron is sufficient to induce a raging migraine. But don't have pain killers on hand when you view it. You could easily O.D. before the first half-hour is out.

Rating:
Summary: Folk Tale from another Era
Review: Of Pasolini's three "Trilogy of Life" films (Decameron, Canterbury Tales, and Arabian Nights), I find the Decameron to be the most disjointed. By removing the original frame-tale (presumably for the sake of length), he opened himself up for some serious flow problems. About halfway through the film, Pasolini himself makes an appearance as a pupil of Giotto who is commissioned to make a painting of Naples on the wall of a church. This becomes a frame-like device (at the tableau scene near the end, you can see many of the characters from the various episodes in the film), but still doesn't make up for the lack of connection (or at least division) between the stories -- one simply stops and the next starts. There are several instances of narrative continuity (look for the grave-robbers at the saint's funeral later in the film), however, including the aforementioned tableau.

That being said, Pasolini's film (and his film-making style) are very influential (most noticeably in the work of Peter Greenaway), with his use of static shots taken from far away in order to give a sense of scale (and awe). Many of the shots in the film are incredibly beautiful (many are simply odd), such as the landscape shots when Andreuccio (played by the incomparable Ninetto Davoli) is running from the city at night.

Overall, while The Decameron is fairly disjointed and shot in a Pasolini's unusual style, it is still a very enjoyable (and hilarious) film. MGM's DVD is a vast improvement over the earlier Image edition, featuring a lush transfer, optional subtitles, and a very strange (and very, very 70's) trailer.

Rating:
Summary: MGM's transfer is gorgeous, Pasolini's film is weird
Review: Of Pasolini's three "Trilogy of Life" films (Decameron, Canterbury Tales, and Arabian Nights), I find the Decameron to be the most disjointed. By removing the original frame-tale (presumably for the sake of length), he opened himself up for some serious flow problems. About halfway through the film, Pasolini himself makes an appearance as a pupil of Giotto who is commissioned to make a painting of Naples on the wall of a church. This becomes a frame-like device (at the tableau scene near the end, you can see many of the characters from the various episodes in the film), but still doesn't make up for the lack of connection (or at least division) between the stories -- one simply stops and the next starts. There are several instances of narrative continuity (look for the grave-robbers at the saint's funeral later in the film), however, including the aforementioned tableau.

That being said, Pasolini's film (and his film-making style) are very influential (most noticeably in the work of Peter Greenaway), with his use of static shots taken from far away in order to give a sense of scale (and awe). Many of the shots in the film are incredibly beautiful (many are simply odd), such as the landscape shots when Andreuccio (played by the incomparable Ninetto Davoli) is running from the city at night.

Overall, while The Decameron is fairly disjointed and shot in a Pasolini's unusual style, it is still a very enjoyable (and hilarious) film. MGM's DVD is a vast improvement over the earlier Image edition, featuring a lush transfer, optional subtitles, and a very strange (and very, very 70's) trailer.

Rating:
Summary: a subtle movie
Review: Pasolini was truly an aesthete and the decameron proves that.This evocation of the Middle Ages of Boccacio is very subtle.Pasolini pays homage to bruegel,his film is a dream of happiness.

Rating:
Summary: Probably Pasolini's best
Review: Pasolini's first film in his "Trilogy of Life". It tells nine separate tells from the book "The Decameron". All have a very ribald sense of humor and has a surprising amount (for an R rated film) of male and female nudity. Not for anyone who is easily offended but a fairly good film for those who are interested. Also there are a few really huge swipes at the Catholic Church--one story has a convent of nuns using a man to sexually satisfy all of them--and this is shown in a positive light!