Martin Bradley Nothing dates as badly as films that seemed revolutionary in their day, whereas films that seemed common-place have, perhaps surprisingly, grown in depth. Films like "The Searchers" and "Vertigo" are so much more than what appears on the surface while a film like "Performance" now feels like a bag of tricks. Bertolucci was only 23 when he made "Before the Revolution" and he brought to it a young man's brio. If he was mimicking anyone it was the trend-setting mystique of Antonioni and perhaps the Rossellini of "Journey to Italy", (referenced here), rather than the old Italian masters like Visconti and De Sica. This was a film that confirmed Bertolucci as an extraordinary new talent, full of visual daring and breaking very much with convention.He used Stendhal's "The Charterhouse of Parma" as a jumping off point to tell the story of Fabrizio, a young bourgeois Italian in love with his pretty young aunt and today the film still looks remarkable; one can see why such a fuss was made of him. Its faults, however, are also fairly obvious. The material now seems thin, even trite, while many of the effects feel dated and very much of their period, (how shocked were audiences at the idea of incest in 1964? How shocked are we now?).Nevertheless, the film remains essential and not just as part of the Bertolucci canon. It's essential if we want to understand the revolution that was sixties cinema. We may no longer think of it as Bertolucci's best film but we can still marvel at how audacious it felt back then while still feeling a little superior in our knowledge that cinema has continued to deepen and to develop in the intervening years.

Andrew Boone Bernardo Bertolucci was probably the last in the line of great filmmakers from Italian cinema's heyday. The neorealist movement, helmed by Rossellini, De Sica, and Visconti, brought Italian cinema into the spotlight in the mid-'40s. The next generation, who had apprenticed under the neorealists, included Fellini, Antonioni, and Monicelli. Following that, Pasolini apprenticed under Fellini, and then, finally, Bertolucci apprenticed under Pasolini. This is all a bit of an oversimplification, mind you, but that's approximately how we arrive at Bertolucci on the Italian cinematic family tree."Before the Revolution", released in 1964, was Bertolucci's second film. His 1962 debut effort, "La commare secca" (a.k.a. "The Grim Reaper"), had been a critical success, although I'd call it only a good film, not a great one. Pasolini's influence is very evident in both films.Bertolucci is clearly a student of cinema. The era of "new wave" directors, who came around in about 1960 and engendered a changing of the guard all across the cinematic landscape, were notable for being the first generation of filmmakers to have any significant critical background. Previous generations of filmmakers had no serious, consistent means of exploring the cinema of other countries, not to mention other generations. These '60s filmmakers, however, thanks to the likes of Langlois and Bazin, were raised on film clubs and therefore exposed to a much wider spectrum of the cinema. As a result, this era of filmmaking is the first to be so heavily subject to that all-important aspect of the cinematic process: influence.It's never difficult to identify a director who has an immense love for cinema. Their films are filled with allusions, pastiche, and references galore, and they exhibit all sorts of influences stemming from different cinematic styles. Bertolucci is one such filmmaker, and "Before the Revolution" is one such film. This is most obvious in one scene, which features explicit dialogue regarding the political merits of many contemporaneous filmmakers, but even aside from that, we can detect a vast world of inspirations in this film. "Before the Revolution" is like an amalgam of Pasolini, Godard, and a left bank nouvelle vague director like Resnais or Varda. Godard's jump cuts and playful style are present at times. We see compositions that are distinctly reminiscent of Varda's "La Pointe-Courte" or Resnais's "Hiroshima mon amour" (similar compositions can also be seen in Antonioni's early '60s work, such as "L'eclisse", as well as in Bergman's "Persona" and Godard's "Une femme mariée"). Most notably, the film shares Pasolini's proclivity for a highly poetic form of cinema. There is poetic narration, but like "Accattone" or "Mamma Roma", the core of the film's poetry is in its visual style.Visually, "Before the Revolution" is absolutely stunning. It's formally impeccable, and the cinematography warrants some analysis. At times it emulates Pasolini's unique pseudo-realist technique, and at other times it is much more formal, featuring very slow, smooth, graceful, poetic camera-work. Some of these latter shots are very much ahead of their time, reminding me of the more recent films of Terrence Malick, or Sorrentino's "The Great Beauty". We can see a good deal of virtuosity in the young Bertolucci here.As for the film's content, it's very much a communist film, focusing on all the usual topics: revolution, the bourgeoisie, et cetera. The film's protagonist is Fabrizio, a young man who has committed himself to the revolution and to breaking free of his bourgeois chains. The film's other two central characters are Cesare, Fabrizio's revolutionary mentor, and Gina, Fabrizio's aunt with whom he begins a love affair. Each character plays their role. Fabrizio is the bourgeoisie, Cesare the revolutionary, and Gina the troubled soul, essentially apolitical because she is too wrapped up in her own existential angst to concern herself with political or revolutionary action. Cesare tries to win Fabrizio over to the revolutionary cause, and Fabrizio wants to be won over, but is he truly committed? Can a bourgeoisie ever be truly committed to the revolution, or will he always bow out "before the revolution" materializes? Perhaps he has too much to lose to truly act on his ideals when the moment for action finally arrives. This was the core of the conflict between workers and students within the revolutionary movement, discussed at length in Godard's "A Film Like Any Other". Workers fought the revolution out of necessity, but the students could always go home to mommy and daddy as soon as the fire got too hot. As outmoded as they may sound in America today, these ideas were central to political cinema for a long time. This issue — the complexities of attempting to break the oppressive bonds of bourgeois society — has been the subject of a great many political films, and it is again here. I'd like to think of "Before the Revolution" as a film about the difficulties of achieving social change, the aspects of the human condition that drive individuals to revolt against society, and the basic need for comfort and security that ultimately undermines the ideals of those who act out of ideology and not practical necessity. The film can certainly be seen that way, and I, personally, want to think of it in those terms because I am not a political person. I'm more interested in subjective portrayals of one individual's vision of life than I am in the politics of revolution. That being said, what Bertolucci intended here was probably not a subjective contemplation of the futility of revolution, but rather an objective reflection on the necessity for total revolution — the need to wipe out every trace of bourgeois society in order to achieve any genuine positive social change. Like most great films, a lot is left open to interpretation here, although maybe less than what appears at first glance, if you know the politics of the time. Certainly, this is an immensely complex, largely under-appreciated, and truly great film. RATING: 9.00 out of 10 stars

runamokprods While hailed as many as a masterpiece (or near), I struggled with Bertolucci's 2nd film, made when he was only 23, although I am a fan of his in general. Beautifully shot, great use of music and unconventional editing, the film is excellent on a film-making and craft level (although it perhaps borrows too liberally from leading film-makers of the era, especially Godard, Antonioni and Resnais). The story of a young bourgeois man trying to come to terms with his tear between his attraction to communism and his desire for an easier life leads him into an incestuous affair with his somewhat older aunt. I found it's themes somewhat muddled, alternating between being heavy-handedly spelled out, or so obtuse I wasn't sure what a given scene was saying. The acting in particular seems a bit all over the place; understated to the point of flatness in one scene, and then almost theatrically over the top the next. At the end I felt glad I'd seen the film, but it didn't stick with me the way Bertolucci's first film "La Commare Secca" or his third "Partner" did. ("Partner" deals with some of the same themes, but in a far more playful, often comedic way). There was a film-school sort of pretentiousness and emotional distance in "Before the Revolution that kept me from feeling moved or from being led to think deeply about the ideas. That said, I am willing to revisit it and see if my reaction changes, and certainly I enjoyed Bertolucci's already masterful use of image and sound, even if the ends he was using them to were a bit muddled.

dwpollar 1st watched 10/17/2005 - 3 out of 10(Dir-Bernardo Bertolucci): Confusing, talkative, political romantic drama, I think. This is one of Bernardo Bertolucci's first films and was supposedly a breakthru film for him, but I just didn't get it. It probably has something to do with the fact that I'm an American with very little understanding of the Italian Revolution and what it meant for the people who lived there, but it also has to do with Bertolucci's lack of any kind background given to the characters. We are greeted with the main character, Fabrizio, running through the streets with his thoughts being displayed as he runs. He meets up with a friend who he urges to become a member of the Party(the Italian Communist Party) and the next thing we know he drowns, and we're at his funeral. Here Fabrizio, reacquaints himself with Aunt Gina, whom he met at another funeral years before, and they start a deeper relationship that lasts thru most of the rest of the movie. The only other character of note is a Communist Tutor named Cesaro, whom Fabrizio speaks highly of but once we meet him we're not quite sure why. Nothing really happens besides this and no-one really does any kind of changing from the beginning to the end and we're left with what appears to be a silly romantic movie in the end. This is at least, all I was able to get out of this movie despite it's attempts at getting me to understand something else. I'm sorry, it just didn't happen for me.