CAESAR MUST DIE : A GREAT FILM BY PRADIP BISWAS, THE INDIAN EXPRESS NEWSPAPERS JURY MEMBER INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL OF INDIA, JURY MEMBER FRIBOURG INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, FIFF,SWISS This time Taviani Brothers have shifted from their earlier pet themes of political struggle to win freedom. No, it is still there. It is nice to see how Tavianis could mould the original plot of Julias Caeser into an educative organism. The career of the Taviani brothers, Paolo and Vittorio, has been a distinguished one, although some admirers would argue that its peaks—films like Padre Padrone, “The Night of the Shooting Stars” (1982) and “Kaos” (1984)—were scaled many years ago. Interesting part of the film is that they have used the original convicts of Rebibbia prison, most deadly and deadly. The film is of 76 minute duration.` It should be mentioned that the Tavianis finest film perhaps is Padre Padrone, the real story of a boy escaping from hard-scrabble peasant life in present-day Sardinia to be educated during his military service on the mainland. The successful efforts of Roberto Rossellini to persuade his fellow jurors to give it the Palme dOr at the 1977 Cannes festival shortened his life. Tavianis’ latest work Caesar Must Die literally hinges on a production of Shakespeares Julius Caesar performed by inmates from the high-security wing at Romes Rebibbia prison, situated in the mid-sea. all hard criminals serving long sentences for murder, drug dealing and offences connected with the mafia and Camorra. Such plays are regularly produced by outside professionals, most famously the Genoese actor and director Fabio Cavalli. Then an opportunity came Taviani Brothers’ way nearly by fluke. They were invited to see a drama an adaptation of Dantes Inferno. When they perceived the play on stage the Tavianis suggested a film version of Julius Caesar that theyd work on as writers and directors in collaboration with Cavalli. Then the agreement was reached and the prison authority gave them official permission. So while the film appears to follow the production from conception to final performance before an audience from outside jail, it is something altogether more constructed than a fly-on-the-wall documentary. We are incidentally reminded of Louis Malles final film, Vanya on 42nd Street, which purports to be a product of André Gregorys New York production of the Chekhov play. Surprisingly the production leaves us wondering whether weve watched a complete, newly conceived work of art, a work-in-progress, a documentary or a combination of all these things. So in a way, certain doubts have been roused in us. Let me tell you that there are plays-within-plays in Hamlet and A Midsummer Nights Dream. The whole of The Taming of the Shrew is a play-within-a-play, a mirror construction, performed for the drunken tinker Christopher Sly to frail impact. This framing device is often dropped by Tavianis. This production of Shakespeares play deconstructed by a jail in the Tavianis Julius Caesar recalls Peter Weisss Marat/Sade, in which the Marquis de Sade directs a play performed by asylum inmates. Though I cannot say Sade did really impact Marxist Tavianis. It also resembles films such as Jules Dassins He Who Must Die, where actors lives are transformed by taking on the identities of the characters they play like In the Jules Dassin film theyre working-class Greeks in a Passion play produced during the Turkish occupation. It is of course a different and truncated facet. Caesar Must Die centres on a production of Shakespeares Julius Caesar performed by inmates from the high-security wing at Romes Rebibbia prison, all hard men serving long sentences for murder, drug dealing and offences connected with the mafia and Camorra. Such plays are regularly produced by outside professionals, most famously the Genoese actor and director Fabio Cavalli. After seeing an adaptation of Dantes Inferno, the Tavianis suggested a film version of Julius Caesarthat theyd work on as writers and directors in collaboration with Cavalli. So while the movie appears to follow the production from conception to final performance before an audience from outside jail, it is something altogether more shaped than a fly-on-the-wall documentary. One thinks of Louis Malles final film, Vanya on 42nd Street, which purports to be a read-through of André Gregorys New York production of the Chekhov play but leaves us wondering whether weve watched a complete, newly conceived work of art, a work-in-progress, a documentary or a combination of all these things. There are plays-within-plays in Hamlet and A Midsummer Nights Dream. The whole of The Taming of the Shrew is a play-within-a-play performed for the drunken tinker Christopher Sly, though this framing device is often dropped. This production of Shakespeares play framed by a jail in the Tavianis Julius Caesar recalls Peter Weisss Marat/Sade, in which the Marquis de Sade directs a play performed by asylum inmates. It also resembles films such as Jules Dassins He Who Must Die, where actors lives are transformed by taking on the identities of the characters they play. (In the Dassin movie theyre working-class Greeks in a Passion play produced during the Turkish occupation.) The film begins and ends with the last moments of Julius Caesar and his regimes, performed on a stage in rough costumes and in colour. It is claimed in between, its shot, as structured, in harsh black-and-white, which the Tavianis actually believe is less realistic than colour. Then we are taken face to face with the striking auditions where each would-be actor gives his name, age and address straight to camera twice. Here we see a new ploy to be used. First as if he was speaking to customs officers, then as if saying farewell to his family. This is followed by the principal actors discovering their characters with the director, who insists on them sticking to their regional accents. In one arresting moment a Camorra strong-arm man says Naples instead of Rome, and explains: It seems as if this Shakespeare was walking the streets of my own city. Stint of shooting and final cutting are done in a manner so taut and haunting. In a different state, the imposing Caesar, who looks like ,and probably is, a mafia capo, turns on Decius, the conspirator dispatched to bring him to the Senate, as if he were a genuine traitor luring him to his death. Briefly they step outside the rehearsal cell ready for a fight. Tavianis looked astonishingly meticulous to re-create Julius Cesar and his period on a rough cut stage image. This is a pared-down production in which the roles of Calphurnia and Portia have been dropped, and theres a touching (if clearly staged) moment when one of the actors runs a hand over a seat in the auditorium and says to himself: Maybe a woman will sit on it. The formative parts of the play are shown in regular rehearsal. But the scenes leading up to the assassination are performed peripatetically all over the cell block. And this is not only very hard but also painstaking in terms of cinematic demand. The requiems spoken over Caesars corpse take place in the exercise yard with prisoners at the surrounding windows acting as the crowd. We are struck by electrifying stuff. At this point the prison life looks inseparable from the play, and the actors merge their roles with their careers as gangsters but with real-life role playing. When Mark Antony repeatedly speaks about men of honour, he talks the language of the mob. Striking feature is that the whole of the film was shot with great care and security belt at the very prison set in the mid ocean. We need to welcome this severe and striking strong work, set inside Rebibbia prison, on the outskirts of Rome. While making the film, innovative contraption is evolved in a number of maximum-security inmates which fills their days and minds. They rehearse with a director and, among themselves, run through various scenes in different parts of the jail; excerpts from the final staging are shown, in color, at the beginning and end of the movie. The rest of the film is in black-and-white, framed with unexcitable care, and the whole thing seems to unfold the dramatic control that is no less compassionate or laboured and painstaking. Though the prisoners are all too real—in an overwhelming scenes and frames acting and picking clapping, we watch them at their auditions, and learn of their sentences and crimes. This is one film where the Tavianis spell out not to use or mangle Shakespeare but to honor him in multiple Italian dialects. A great film indeed, never to fade away from our memory. END
Posted on: Sun, 25 Jan 2015 05:06:02 +0000
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