BlazeLime Strong and Moving!

Vashirdfel Simply A Masterpiece

ChicRawIdol A brilliant film that helped define a genre

Philippa All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

disinterested_spectator Raffaella, who is a rich woman, her husband, and their rich friends rent a yacht and go sailing in the Mediterranean. She and her husband carry on screaming arguments about political ideology, with Raffaella expressing her fascist views with much vehemence. We all expect Italians in movies to be passionate, but we have never seen anything like this. Gennarino is a deckhand and a communist, whom she treats like dirt.When Raffaella and Gennarino get stranded on a deserted island, he decides to reverse roles with a vengeance. He beats her into submission, forcing her to call him Signor Carunchio, while calling her Raffaella (when not calling her a bitch or an industrial whore), instead of Signora Lanzetti, as he did on board the yacht. Then, when all this verbal and physical abuse has finally made her want him to ravish her brutally, he says that is not enough. She must tell him she loves him, kiss his feet, and worship him like a god. She actually does kiss his feet and submit to him totally, falling madly in love with him. But he still beats her whenever she misbehaves, as when she presumes to think instead of doing what she is told.This may be a minor point, but it is odd that Gennarino, the communist, believes that women should be totally subservient to men, which we would be more likely to associate with fascism.Anyway, the day finally arrives when a boat comes within sight of the island. Raffaella does not want to signal them because she fears being rescued might spoil their happiness. But Gennarino believes that only if they are rescued can he be sure that she truly loves him. Once rescued, Raffaella might have been able to thwart public opinion and marry Gennarino, but when she sees him being greeted by his wife, who talks about their children, she has misgivings. But given Gennarino's attitude toward women, why should he care about what happens to his wife? He wants Raffaella to go back and live on the island with him, but she decides against it. He reverts to calling her a bitch and an industrial whore.Because this is a comedy, we hesitate to take it too seriously, but there simply is not enough humor in this movie to overcome the revulsion we feel at the way he treats her, especially since the movie seems to prove he is right in believing that a man can make a woman love him by degrading her and beating her.

chaos-rampant What marvelous Italian sensibility! Italians have to be muted for drama, but give them comedy and they soar, it's who they are, who we are in general down South and all over the Mediterranean - boisterous, frivolous, yelling past each other out of some need to stay afloat, lest the silence bogs us down.The allegory is of course as obvious as the characters, a shrill rich wife and a grumbling sailor, a communist we're told, on board her yacht during a cruise get stranded in a deserted island. Of course the dynamics shift - we see how easy and quick it is for him to become a tyrant now that he has the upper hand, how degrading for her to be ordered about. But then sex enters the picture and that changes everything; she's beaten around, almost raped and comes to love the submission. As thin as the politics may be, so much more subversive when it becomes sexual. Rape fantasies are common in men and women alike, no reason to hide, and nothing peculiar about it - sex is after all in a primal way about the swap of power. But here just as about the fantasy is about to be consummated, at the peak of sexual paroxysm, this is the moment the filmmaker chose to have the man pull back and be revealed a delusional fool - she must cherish him as her god and so on.The question that looms, a deep deep one, is was it the island? Or is it civilization that obscures? Which of the two shows their true self? Eventually they bond as lovers, but that is based on everything else we've seen. Do the limits imposed by being seen and known in public lead into delusions of self? Or does uninhibited freedom? Was it true love or was it a simple desire that found no limits to run up against? Who's to make all these impositions of truth anyway?And we have to counterpoint all this against the richness of how they hold themselves in each other's eyes, some of the most expressive eyes in film - it's perfectly cast anyway, but the eyeplay between the two is marvelous, starting from that moment they share on the deck one night.So this is fascinating stuff, about limits of self, about a slippery passion and having no logical truth that can explain beyond it, the only thing it asks is that you don't be moral about it. I can only imagine it better in Pasolini's hands, this lover of textures and breezes of air.

Marcelo Cunha When assessing the fighting that occurs between Raffaella and Gennarino in Lina Wertmuller's Swept Away (1974), many critics are led to believe that the movie discusses sexual roles in society, or Gennarino's misogyny, as Raffaella becomes subordinate and is slapped many times by the male Gennarino. Thinking of this satirical film solely in terms of the battle of the sexes only diverts viewers' attention away from the political meaning, which is much more distinct: the conflict between social classes and the rivalry between Italy's richer north and poorer southern region. The moral point of this satire is to depict the timeless clash of the two most opposing political views at the time the film was made in 1974. Only by considering the political situation in Italy in the 1970s, a period laden with social conflicts, and paying heed to the political dialogues and symbolism in the movie, can one truly understand the satirical theme of Swept Away. In Swept Away, political discussions among the characters are shown from the beginning to the end of the movie. The two main characters are not only separate by gender, but also by region of birth, class and politics. Gennarino considers the capitalist society as evil and is a committed Communist, while Raffaella is a raving capitalist. Even though a New York Times article addresses this movie as "Lina Wertmuller's Epic Battle of Sexes" alluding only to the physical fights between the two main characters, one should remember that for each slap on Raffaella's face, Gennarino names an evil deed the north Italian capitalists have done to the poor, which brings us back to the conflict of classes. But some insist there is no political content at all in this movie. Tania Modleski finds it an antifeminist, misogynist, film about men's sexual fantasies and sexual roles and attitudes in society, that the scenery of a desert island only makes the plot a classic masculine porno fantasy and an insult to feminists. Moreover, the author Lina Wertmuller despises ugly women, as the lovely beauty of Raffaella throughout the movie is towards to the end contrasted with the ugliness and unpleasant manners of Gennarino's wife. Lina Wertmuller has been indeed attacked from critics on feminist grounds. One of the misogynist critics brings up these questions: "For was not Wertmuller humiliating the woman merely to cram down our throats the spurious thesis that a work-class lover is so virile that we would at once be Swept Away by his abusive charm? That Woman secretly wishes to be abused and in fact can attain sexual gratification only by submitting to violence and degradation? And this thesis from a woman who calls herself a revolutionary? Are Wertmuller's women mere cows, anxious to be mastered and abused?" (Melle 82). Most of the feminist criticism centers on the scenes of physical fighting on the island, where Gennarino only uses violence as a reaction against his learning and socio-cultural limitations, of which Raffaella tirelessly makes him aware. Raffaella is a blonde, blue-eyed northern Italian; her northern accent is meant to be more sophisticated than that of the dark-skinned Gennarino, who speaks with a rustic and thick Sicilian accent. Not only because of their different accents, but the fights are also regarding their class inability to communicate that includes a mixture of difficult vocabulary and different values. The movie shows us a conflict of classes between two opposing stereotypes representing two extreme different worlds, the rich and the poor, the capitalist and the communist, the North and the South, the "pale" the "dark" skinned Italians. This conflict of classes reflects Italy's social reality of the time when Swept Away was released, in 1974, when the Italian political context in the late 1960s was characterized by social disorder, which resulted in a difficult and contradictory situation in the 1970s, the time when advanced and traditional sections of society got in disagreements creating serious national problems between north and south. In Swept Away, Wertmuller intelligently explores human emotions through the interaction of classes that defines and motivates not only Gennarino and Rafaella's behavior but also everyone's reality under capitalist society. On the yacht Gennarino works hard but his work does not mean anything, Rafaella maintains the position of a boss because of an accident of birth. She does not earn her position; she does not work for this position. While on the island Gennarino works and his work gives him power. He feeds them, hunts, builds the fire, and creates a place to sleep. His work has value while Rafaella's accident of birth does not guarantee a privileged position anymore. Perhaps, reviews should focus more on the issue of class rather than finding it misogynist. Works CitedCanby, Vincent. "Lina Wertmuller's Epic Battle of Sexes." New York Times. September 21, 1975: x15.Mellen, Joan. "On Lina Wertmuller." Society. October 12, 2007: 82-84.Modleski, Tania. "Wertmuller's Women Swept Away by the Unusual Destiny." Jump Cut: A Review of Contemporary Media. 1976.

alicecbr Cinematography: superior. Writing: excellent. Acting: somewhat over the top in the political arguments yelled at top volumn. Sexual chemistry between the proletarian and 'aristocrat': Priceless.I found myself mesmerized. The huge eyes of the man, as he listens to the bigoted arrogant arguments of the beautiful woman are amazing, as you can see the tension and anger building. Turns out, he is a devoted communist, not a follower of the totalitarian government in Russia...so often confused with true communism, but a devoted communist. One of those.We are about to go crazy with the stupid mindless arguing by these rich people on this gorgeous yacht, when finally we are rescued by the imperious bikini-girl, demanding that she be taken to the others to fish at 7 p.m. Of course, we all know that they won't get there, as the motor kicks out and they wander around in the middle of a gorgeous sea. No one seems to ever have to go to the bathroom, unfortunately. Just as well. No, they don't get thirsty either.But the acting, especially the fury between them which resolves itself into hot, flaming sex that she has to beg for is glorious!!!! It is definitely NOT what you would expect.Spoiler*****************8 When finally united with his wife, he asks tenderly about the kids. So you know, he can't return to that magic island where all the love was white hot. That's not real. But when he takes the 100000 lire and buys a beautiful ring for the woman, you know that he is showing todo el mundo that he is indeed a man, buying her this 'divorcement' ring....already knowing she'll reject his invitation to return to the island.Great movie. I"m glad I bought it, and I WISH there was one of those discussions on it to give us some insight into the Italian government of the 70s. I was confused by the discussion of the Pope, fascism and communism. Had I known the political climate of Italy at the time, I might have understood this part better.