1900 (film)

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Template:Short description Template:Distinguish Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox film 1900 (Template:Langx, "Twentieth Century") is a 1976 epic historical drama film directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, and featuring an international ensemble cast including Robert De Niro, Gérard Depardieu, Dominique Sanda, Francesca Bertini, Laura Betti, Stefania Casini, Ellen Schwiers, Sterling Hayden, Alida Valli, Romolo Valli, Stefania Sandrelli, Donald Sutherland and Burt Lancaster. Set in Bertolucci's ancestral region of Emilia, Italy, the film chronicles the lives and friendship of two men—the landowning Alfredo Berlinghieri (De Niro) and the peasant Olmo Dalcò (Depardieu)—as they witness and participate in the political conflicts between fascism and communism that took place in Italy in the first half of the 20th century. The film premiered out of competition at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival.<ref name="festival-cannes.com">Template:Cite web</ref>

With a runtime of 317 minutes in its original version, 1900 is known for being one of the longest commercially released films in history. Its great length led to it being presented in two parts when originally released in many countries, including Italy, East and West Germany, Denmark, Belgium, Norway, Sweden, Colombia, Pakistan and Japan. In other countries, including the United States, a single edited version of the film was released.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> 1900 has become widely regarded as a cult classic, and has received several special-edition home-video releases from a variety of distributors.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> A restoration of the film premiered out of competition at the 74th Venice International Film Festival in 2017.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In 2008, the film was included on the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage's 100 Italian films to be saved, a list of 100 films that "have changed the collective memory of the country between 1942 and 1978".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Plot

Act One

April 25th, 1945, Liberation Day: In the lower area around the city of Parma, armed farmers capture the remaining fascists, while a young partisan boy holds at gunpoint the rich landowner Alfredo Berlinghieri.

1901

The town's hunchback, Rigoletto, announces the death of Giuseppe Verdi. Nearby, on the large Berlinghieri family farm in the lower area of Parma of the Busseto countryside, two women are giving birth at the same time. Rosina Dalcò, a widow and daughter of farmers, gives birth to a boy, whom she calls Olmo, of unknown father. Eleonora, wife of Giovanni, son of the landowner, Mr. Alfredo Berlinghieri, also gives birth to a boy, who is called Alfredo like his paternal grandfather. In this moment of joy, in which social disparities disappear, Mr. Alfredo, content for the birth of his nephew, distributes bottles of champagne to the laborers and toasts to the fate of the two unborn children. Among these is Leo, Olmo's grandfather and progenitor of the large Dalcò family. He is not particularly enthusiastic and joyful about the birth of the child, as everyone sees him only as an extra mouth to feed, in a family that already has forty members.

1908

At the age of seven, Alfredo and Olmo grow up with the customs of their respective families, demonstrating that they have profoundly different personalities and ways of seeing the world. The two share a sort of friendship, made up of fights and bickering, which always end with a smile. After all, Alfredo admires Olmo and the latter envies Alfredo for his wealth. Meanwhile, the first agricultural machinery arrive at the farm, frowned upon by both Leo and Mr. Alfredo, who is increasingly suffering from depression. To protest against the latest technological advancements, some laborers begin to frequent farmers' leagues and adhere to the ideas of revolutionary socialism. At the Berlinghieri's estate, Eleonora's sister and her daughter, Regina, Alfredo's cousin and peer, arrive.

During a ball organized by the farmers, Mr. Alfredo's depressive crisis culminates in his suicide, hanging himself with an iron chain inside the cow stable. His son Giovanni, second-born, falsifies his father's will and takes over the inheritance and the farm, becoming the new owner to the detriment of his older brother, Ottavio, devoted to leisurely life around Europe. Once Giovanni takes control of the farm, a devastating hail storm destroys half of the harvest. Giovanni therefore goes to the laborers to communicate the damage that has occurred, as well as informing them that because of this the work will be doubled, clearly without any increase in pay. One of the labourers, Montanaro, cuts off his ear as a sign of protest. The general discontent leads to a real agrarian strike and, to prevent the land from going to waste, the landlords are forced, with embarrassment, to work as labourers. Leo, after witnessing the radical change of the new generations, suffers a heart attack under a tree.

Due to the strike, which lasts over three months, there is a lack of food for the labourers' children. Therefore, Olmo and his other peers are sent to Genoa. After saying goodbye to his mother, Olmo boards the train, decorated with red flags made for the strike, and goes away into the countryside, until he reaches the Ligurian coast.

1918

Ten years later, Alfredo and Olmo have become grown men. When World War I broke out in 1914, Olmo enlisted and took part in the fighting in the Royal Italian Army, while Alfredo enlisted with the rank of lieutenant thanks to bribes enlarged by his father, managed to avoid enrolment, despite a sincere desire on Alfredo's part to take part in the fighting. At the end of the hostilities, Olmo returns to the farm, where he is reunited with his mother, the laborers and Alfredo.

At the farm, however, Olmo finds a sour situation: since most of the men went "to die" in the war, as Giovanni claims, productivity was reduced, and to make up for the lack of personnel and enrich his assets Giovanni lowered the wages of the laborers and purchased new, increasingly efficient modern agricultural machinery. Furthermore, Giovanni has hired shady figures at the farm to keep the farmers at bay and avoid new strikes. Among these is Attila Melanchini, an ambitious, ruthless and perverse man, who quickly becomes Giovanni's right-hand man.

Olmo also meets Anita Furlan, a refugee and teacher from Verona infused with socialist ideals, with whom he soon falls in love. The two begin a fierce fight against the powerful and against the exploitation of the poorer classes. Alfredo, on the other hand, leads a comfortable life and, despite professing to be a socialist, does nothing concrete to help the workers.

1919

The landowners are alarmed by the revolutionary uprisings and the continuous protests, in particular by the refusal of a sharecropper, Oreste, to leave the Avanzini farm, one of the owners under Giovanni's control, on St. Martin's Day, i.e. the one traditionally used by sharecroppers to move houses, farms or towns. Oreste tenaciously resists the Royal Italian Guards, frightening the owners. They decide to unite and organize in the church to form a group dedicated to suffocating the revolts. In this way, the phenomenon of squadrismo makes its entry into the Emilian countryside. Attila, co-founder of the anti-riot group, becomes the lover of Regina, Alfredo's cousin, and takes on the role of team leader of the Blackshirts, once they have been included in the growing fascist phenomenon.

Alfredo and Olmo travel to Parma to have fun, but the situation worsens dramatically when the two have a grotesque misadventure with Neve, an epileptic prostitute. Alfredo, who ran away to his uncle Ottavio's house, meets Ada, a young, sweet and extravagant viveuse from a wealthy family. During a village festival, in which Olmo and Anita also participate, the two have sexual intercourse in the barn while the people's house is burned by the black shirts led by Annibale.

In the tragic epilogue of Act One, while Olmo and Anita parade in mourning through the streets of Parma with the laborers and the bodies of the dead from the people's house, Attila, in command of a fascist squad, prepares to ruin their funeral.

Act Two

File:Novecento - Sutherland-De Niro-Depardieu.jpg
A scene from Act Two with Donald Sutherland, Robert De Niro and Gérard Depardieu

1922

Two years after the events of Act One, Mussolini has taken power and Fascism is governing Italy. Alfredo is on holiday in the island of Capri in a luxurious hotel with his uncle Ottavio, who turns out to be homosexual, and Ada, who has become Alfredo's girlfriend. The three intend to travel to the island of Taormina, as they want to escape as far as possible from the fascist violence of the blackshirts which still rages in the Emilian countryside. During the departure, however, news arrives of the worsening of Alfredo's father's illness, who is therefore forced to return to the farm. Here, after burying his little-loved parent and inheriting the role of landlord, Alfredo comes across Olmo stealing his late father's gun. Olmo explains to Alfredo that, during the time he was away, he had a daughter, who he named after her mother, Anita, when she died in childbirth giving birth to her. Olmo also talks about how Attila has become even more brutal than before, violently exercising his control over the farm and the labourers. Olmo perjures his friend to fire Attila, but Alfredo refuses out of fear. This represents the beginning of a gradual rift between the two friends.

Once all the Berlinghieri family members are reunited, Alfredo announces that he will marry Ada. This decision arouses the morbid jealousy of Regina, in love with her cousin, who became Attila's lover only to make Alfredo jealous. During the wedding celebrations, to which Olmo does not participate with the excuse of not having been invited, despite the presence of the entire Dalcò family; Attila and Regina, after being scolded by Alfredo for their unwelcome behavior, kill the young scion Patrizio Avanzini, son of the landowner co-creator of the anti-riot league, after abusing him during a sexual practice. Olmo is accused of the murder because of his absence at the wedding celebrations and although Ada tries to defend him he is beaten up by the black shirts commanded by Attila, who is only looking for a scapegoat to deflect any type of accusation against him. Alfredo watches helplessly while Olmo is being beaten, and is saved at the last minute by a deranged vagabond who accuses himself of the crime committed, exonerating Olmo, who is freed.

1935

Thirteen years later, Olmo has reinvented himself as a butcher, due to the preponderant technological advancement that is rapidly replacing human labor in the fields. Alfredo, on the other hand, has become a ruthless landlord just like his father and Ada is an alcoholic disliked by her husband and his family.

On the evening of Christmas Eve, Ada, tired of her husband preventing her from drinking by closing the liquor room and banning her from the clubs in the city, escapes from home and goes to see Olmo, where, after a brief conversation about the declining friendship between Alfredo and Olmo, Ada runs away again. Alfredo, after much wandering, finds her in a tavern, where the two make peace. Attila and Regina, meanwhile, continue their crimes: determined to bring their relationship out into the open, they decide to take over the Pioppi's villa, a sumptuous residence, now in decline. As a matter of fact the Pioppi even had to mortgage the villa due to their debts. Attila and Regina, after making her husband suffer a heart attack, show up at to the widow's house on the evening of Christmas Eve. After inviting them in, the widow traps them in the living room in an attempt to take revenge for her husband's death and thus keep the villa. Attila and Regina, however, soon discover her location. Attila destroys the living room door, rapes and kills the widow, who is then impaled on the entrance gate of the villa. Alfredo and Ada, who were driving back home, come across a gathering created around the hanging body of the widow. Once again Attila arrives to remove his suspicions, hypothesizing that the widow was killed in a love crime, after having prostituted herself to repay the debts that the mortgage was not giving. Ada, shocked by yet another act of violence by the blackshirts, escapes in Alfredo's car, leaving her husband stranded. The latter, desperate, goes to see Olmo, but she is not there. The two talk for a long time, like old friends who meet again, but despite the calm atmosphere the two are now distant. Alfredo returns home where he finds Ada locked in her chambers.

1942

Seven years later the geopolitical situation has turned upside down: the Duce, despite being aware of Italian military and industrial inadequacies, has declared war on France and the United Kingdom alongside Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany.

Attila and Regina live a comfortable life with three children inside the former Pioppi's villa, with Attila having become an even more ruthless and cruel fascist hierarch. One day Attila shows the farmers a new tractor, the result of fascist propaganda aimed at demonstrating Italian industrial power, which he would like the labourers to buy. Olmo, who is there together with his daughter Anita intent on selling packhorses, is made fun of by Attila, who would like to have both him and his horses sold to a fascist merchant, an acquaintance of his. Olmo, however, has had enough of Attila's overbearing behavior: together with the other laborers he rebels, hitting him with horse faeces and humiliating him in front of the farmers. Olmo is satisfied with his personal revolt, but is inevitably forced to flee together with Anita knowing that Attila will return for retaliation in full fascist style. Attila's anger doesn't wait, and he destroys his house in search of incriminating evidence. He is stopped at the last minute by Alfredo, who too, tired of Attila's violence, fires him once and for all. Attila, however, takes definitive revenge on a rainy day, in which he kills all the laborers who participated in Olmo's revolt.

Alfredo returns home enthusiastic, to report the news of Attila's dismissal to Ada, but it is too late and he finds her chambers completely empty. Ada, who lived segregated in the house after the murder of the widow, surrounded only by the farmers who came to visit her, tired of her indifferent husband runs away forever.

1945

We return to Liberation Day. The female laborers, led by Anita, capture Attila and Regina, intent on escaping. After holding them inside a sty, the two are dragged to the town cemetery for a summary execution. Attila, in a last, desperate attempt to save himself, takes the blame for the murders of Patrizio and the Pioppis on their graves, but the farmers see his pathetic intention. The farmers execute Attila and abandon Regina in poverty, even though she begs to be killed so she can join her deceased husband.

Olmo also shows up at the cemetery, having finally returned after his escape. Together with Anita and the other laborers they return to the farm, where they find Alfredo, held at gunpoint by a young partisan. The farmers of the lower Parma area, who were also joined by those of the upper Parma area, after having escaped from the Nazi-fascists, began a popular process led by Olmo. He, however, does not execute Alfredo, as the farmers would like, but condemns him to a virtual death, firing a rifle shot into the air to symbolize the killing of the vile part of his dearest friend. The laborers initially do not understand the choice to spare the owner, but then accept it with a liberating race through the fields under the great red flag, kept hidden during the Fascist regime, created by sewing together all the red flags that the laborers had created years earlier for the strike held at the beginning of the century.

Towards the end of the day the partisans' trucks arrive, in which are also present representatives of the CLNAI, announcing the fall of the Nazi-fascists and general disarmament. Among the general protests of the farmers who would like to continue the armed struggle, Olmo is the first to put down his rifle, reiterating that it is not a gesture of surrender to the landlords. The farmers soon follow him, celebrating the end of hostilities by running with the big red flag on the outskirts of the farm.

Alfredo and Olmo, now definitively reconciled, begin to fight again like when they were children.

1976

In an Italy that is the result of the economic miracle and profoundly different from that of the beginning of the century, Olmo and Alfredo, now over seventy years old, continue to fight and chase each other joyfully. After growing old together, the two, aware that they have lived their lives, choose to die like their respective grandparents: Olmo, awaiting death, sits in the shade of a tree, while Alfredo lies down on the train tracks, like when, many years earlier, he had done with the train headed to Genoa.

Cast

File:Quarto Stato.jpg
The initial credits are displayed over a zoom out of Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo's The Fourth Estate.

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Dub voices (Italian version)

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Production

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Release

The original director's cut of the film runs 317 minutes (5 hours, 17 minutes) and was released in two parts in Italy.<ref name=fox/> Alberto Grimaldi, the film's producer, was contractually obligated to deliver a 195-minute (3 hour, 15 minute) version to Paramount Pictures for release in the United States and Canada. Bertolucci originally wanted to release the film in two parts, but, on Grimaldi's refusal, 20th Century-Fox picked up distribution in the United States, dropping out when Bertolucci declined to shorten the film by 80 minutes.<ref name=fox>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

Grimaldi locked out Bertolucci from the editing room and assembled a 180-minute cut. Bertolucci, unsatisfied with Grimaldi's cut, decided to compromise.<ref name="interview">Template:Cite web</ref> His 247-minute (4 hour, 7 minute) version was initially released in the United States. In 1987, the Bravo channel broadcast the uncut version with English-dubbed dialogue. In 1991, the film was restored to its original length and shown in a limited release.Template:Citation needed The film has been shown uncut on Sky Movies and Film4.Template:Citation needed

When Bertolucci released his 317-minute version to theaters, the Motion Picture Association of America classified the film with an X rating. The 245-minute American cut, which was also officially available on home-video in the United States, retained its R rating. In 2006, Paramount surrendered the NC-17 rating of the uncut version, then released it as unrated on DVD on 5 December 2006. This same uncut version was released on Blu-ray in the US by Olive Films on 15 May 2012.

Reception

1900 won the 1977 Bodil Award for Best Non-American Film and received second place in the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Cinematography.<ref>1900 awards at IMDb</ref>

Paramount theatrically released the shorter version in the United States on October 7, 1977,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and it has received mixed reviews from American critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a 52% "Rotten" rating based on 23 reviews, with a weighted average of 6.1/10.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Metacritic film prose<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In the Chicago Sun-Times, film critic Roger Ebert wrote that the film "doesn't seem to go anywhere. It's an epic only by virtue of its length."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Soundtrack

Template:Music ratings The music for the movie was composed by Ennio Morricone, who included several melodies from Giuseppe Verdi operas.

  1. "Romanzo" – 4:05
  2. "Estate – 1908" – 5:01
  3. "Autunno" – 4:43
  4. "Regalo di Nozze" – 2:45
  5. "Testamento" – 2:25
  6. "Polenta" – 1:07
  7. "Il Primo Sciopero" – 2:48
  8. "Padre e Figlia" – 1:27
  9. "Tema di Ada" – 4:50
  10. "Apertura Della Caccia" – 5:44
  11. "Verdi E Morto" – 2:30
  12. "I Nuovi Crociati" – 3:32
  13. "Il Quarto Stato" – 1:33
  14. "Inverno – 1935" – 2:45
  15. "Primavera – 1945" – 2:06
  16. "Olmo E Alfredo" – 2:18

See also

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Notes

1.Template:NoteParamount Pictures distributed the edited version of the film in the United States theatrically; 20th Century-Fox handled Italian distribution of the film and United Artists handled distribution in select territories including France, West Germany, Scandinavia and Australia while independent distributors released the film in other territories; Fox obtained rights to the film in the territories controlled by independent distributors at the time of the film's release on VHS.

References

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Further reading

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