A Secret Never to Be Told

I have, now, a list of things this film is not that I have read that it is. It is not as bad as its initial reception at Cannes, where it was famously pretty much booed off the screen. Conversely, it is not the second-best film ever made, the runner-up to Kane. And I think the person on IMDB who calls it a "romantic thriller" needs to go look up the definitions of the words "romantic" and "thriller." There is a relationship around which we circle, but it's not a very romantic one. There's some pretty unpleasant stuff. There's never really a moment where you look at the two main characters and think, "Yeah, these are two people in love." Or even "It's a good idea for these two people to be in a relationship." And while there is a mystery, there's no real suspense to it, and eventually, it fades in importance. Certainly there is no fear that these two people, or even just one of them, will be in danger if the mystery is not resolved.

A group of people go sailing in the Aeolian Sea, one of those places whose name haunted my childhood due to my mythology fixation. Our main focus is on Anna (Lea Massari), who has disappointed her father (Renzo Ricci), who wanted her to spend time with him. Instead, she is going on this cruise with her friend, Claudia (Monica Vitti) and the others. She is also there to meet her lover, Sandro (Gabriele Ferzetti), in part to tell him that she doesn't really have much interest in him anymore. They fight, and she goes wandering off across the island on her own and out of the realm of human awareness. If anyone ever sees Anna again, it is not known to us. In theory, Sandro and Claudia are part of the search for her, but as they search, they entwine around one another, becoming in the end more interested in their burgeoning relationship than the missing Anna. Presumably Anna's father still cares, but it doesn't really seem anyone else does after a while.

Really, everyone in this film, including and perhaps especially Anna, is madly self-absorbed. It's part of why I don't think Claudia and Sandro make a good couple; a good couple would worry about each other more than they seem to. Oh, don't get me wrong--I do think part of a good relationship is knowing when to think about yourself. I'm also pleased that Claudia, midway through the film, does not want Sandro to tell her that he loves her, because then she will get unreasonable expectations. On the other hand, she pretty quickly then tells him to tell her anyway. She tells him to go away and leave her, but when he doesn't, she lets him. He doesn't listen to her, essentially no matter what she says. The other passengers from the cruise seem kind of annoyed that Anna has presented such a burden to them, and, of course, there's Anna herself. Her father has been looking forward to seeing her, as far as I can tell, and she didn't tell him she's not going to spend the weekend, or whatever it is, with him until the very last minute. She's basically ditching her father to go sailing and ditch her boyfriend.

So let's talk about that "second-best film ever made" title. There is a British film magazine called Sight and Sound. In 1952, they polled critics and directors and assembled a top ten list of the best films ever made. They have done this again every ten years. In 1962, Citizen Kane was first and this was second. (Notably, Kane does not appear on the first list.) It gradually slipped down the list, and by 1992, it didn't appear at all. (They also started dividing the list into two top tens--critics and directors each get their own lists.) The list has gotten more in tune with my own tastes in another pivotal way; the newest lists feature no film more recent that The Godfather Part II, which ties in with my belief of "there's no such thing as an instant classic." In fact, it kind of feels as though having chosen it for the 1962 list was a kind of snobbishness, honestly. Championing an underground success and all that. To me, it seems almost as though its slip is a gradual awareness of that fact.

I think the film kind of goes on too long, though I'm not sure how much that's the fact that I just really don't like these people. Time spent with people you don't like is always so excruciating, after all. Of course, Antonioni seems to have had a natural gift for film; this is not actually a very early film of his, but I think it's very early as far as films the greater community noticed. It actually ended up winning the special jury prize at Cannes, surely the fastest turnaround in attitude toward any film ever. I'm not really big on the story, particularly. Given the choice, I'd much rather watch Blowup again. However, I can see the technical skill in this, especially early in the film, when we are still search for Anna on Lisca Bianca. (Oddly, Lea Massari had a heart attack and spent two days in a coma, and the film crew ended up being completely stranded on the island at one point due to bad weather. Life was messing with Antonioni, clearly.) And, frankly, while I like that shot of Claudia running down the hallway that was so reviled in the first screening, yes, there are shots I would not have let go on as long as they did.