THE DECAMERON
Italy, 1971, 111 minutes, Colour.
Franco Citti, Ninetto Davoli.
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini.
The Decameron is the first of three films by Pasolini from medieval sources. (It was followed by The Canterbury Tales and Arabian Nights). As a visual presentation of Boccaccio's Neapolitan stories, the film is quite excellent; the use of Neapolitan profiles of non-professional actors, the use of medieval settings, the countryside, costuming, colour and composition of the frames. Boccaccio's material is, of course, a controversial area for sex and the film medium, dealing as it does with simplicity and hypocrisy, the exploiters and the exploited and the realities of sexuality.
The Decameron raises questions as to how far one can go in visual presentation of sexuality. The mind behind the film warrants some respect for judging Pasolini, his successes and his lapses. Sexploitation films (including an Italian Forbidden Decameron) might look similar, but there is a world of difference between them. Many, however, consider that Pasolini went overboard with The Canterbury Tales (1973). There is much human folly to be laughed at in this film and much to be asked about the quality of society, honesty and exploitation. An interesting film from a man whose range includes St. Matthew's Gospel, Sophocles, Euripides and his own original work.
1. What was the point behind each story - in terms of good and evil, morality of individuals and society, hypocrisy, the opportunists versus the dupes? Where do Boccaccio's sympathies lie? His values? Where do Pasolini's lie? His values?
a) Andreuccio of Perugia - gullible, greedy, yet simple and played on; the physicality of his humiliation as well as the hurt to his pride; the lady and her techniques for fraud, her household helping her; her lies and Andreuccio's believing them; the grave-robbers, religion and the dead, helped by the sacristan, using Andreuccio for the dirty work; the ugliness of the dead bishop, the superstition of the robbers; the coincidence of Andreuccio's release (and his fear of death); his reward?
b) Mussetto and the Nuns - the telling of the story by the old man in Naples, the picture of religion, of convent life and nuns (a general condemnation or a case to expose hypocrisy?); Musetto's trick - why? -Its. effect on him? The young nuns? The envious community; the superior and Musetto's denunciation, the miracle - the end of the story? Attitudes to sexuality and chastity and to religion?
c) Peronella and the jar - the picture of adultery; the duped husband - does the story imply that he should have been duped?
d) Ciapalletto - his killing someone at the start of the film; his presence in the market during the story of Musetto, his mission to Germany; the impression he made; his reputation, his illness; his confession and death? Was he successful in duping people about his holy confession?
e) Isabella and Lorenzo - the nature of their love; why did the brothers oppose it - on what grounds (and their own sexual morals)? Renzo as sympathetic and simple, victim of snobbery, yet duped by the brothers, the horror of his murder; the point of Isabella's preserving his head; the point being made about society and love?
f) Caterina, - its similarities with the previous story; the love and its fulfilment; the attitudes of the parents and their consent to the marriage; pride, money?
g) Don Gianni - the similarities with Peronella and her jar? Exploiters and duped; the gullibility of the husband; his trust in the clergy; hypocrisy? Did the husband deserve the trick played on him?
h) Tingoccio and Menccio - as men, libertines, attitudes towards sin, punishment, death; the stopping of sinning because of fear of hell; the reassurance that sexual sins were not the most seriously punished - the point being nude?
i) Giotto - his coming to paint, his fresco, its place in the Church for Neapolitan society and people? The function of a painter? Why finish a work of art when it is so nice to dream about it?
2. Why did Pasolini choose to film Boccaccio's stories (and later Chaucer and the Arabian Nights)? What relevance and impact have they today? Have the concerns and styles of a medieval period a meaning for us?
3. The social order and society of Pasolini's Naples - hierarchy of classes, values, hypocrisy, morals?
4. The vice of inertia, lack of living - the relationship between the duped and the opportunists?
5. The comedy and beauty of this world? The Rabelaisian humour and its place today? The satire and exposure of moral foibles?
