Before the Revolution (1964): Critical Response to Bertolucci’s Sophomore–Then and Now
Critics Response
Cited as “one of the masterpieces of Italian cinema” by Film4, it is featured in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, where Colin MacCabe describes it as “the perfect portrait of the generation who were to embrace revolt in the late 1960s, and a stunning portrait of Parma—Bertolucci’s own city.”
Luana Ciavola, author of Revolutionary Desire in Italian Cinema, believes the film gives the impression of coming from within the bourgeoisie, but at the same time being against it. He writes of it: “the revolt of the protagonist finds support in political commitment. Sustained by an erotic desire, the revolt is fostered by the political ideology that provides a raison d’etre as well as a symbolic terrain through which to articulate the revolt. Even more, the ideology, embodied by Cesare, provides Fabrizio with a superior meaning with which to confront and shape his rebel self. Through ideology, Fabrizio spells out and clarifies his course of revolt and singularity of rebel subject, and eventually his desire for revolt”.
David Jenkins, the Time Out critic, noted that like “all of Bertolucci’s movies, there’s a central conflict between the ‘radical’ impulses and a pessimistic (and-or willing) capitulation to the mainstream of bourgeois society and culture.”
Bertolucci attempted a “symbolic autobiography” in his classical construction of the film, in which loss and defeat are notable themes. The failure at love symbolizes “a death of the past, an angst-ridden sense of futility in any kind of revolutionary striving, whether emotional, political or merely intellectual, amid the defeat of contemporary society.”
Bertolucci uses poetic sounds and images to communicate emotions and ideas, such as in the disturbing final scene where Fabrizio and Clelia’s wedding is intercut with Cesare reading “Moby Dick” to youngsters.
Archer: Bertolucci used cinematic references to Italian and French directors such as Roberto Rossellini and Alain Resnais, and managed to “assimilate a high degree of filmic and literary erudition into a distinctively personal visual approach,” showing “outstanding promise” as a filmmaker.
TimeOut: although it is a “leisurely, verbose and stylish film made by thinkers for thinkers, the film “feels like it’s caught between two stools: it lacks the acute social observation found in Bertolucci’s stunning debut, The Grim Reaper (1963), but it also fails to achieve the levels of free-flowing fizz displayed in his follow-up, Partner (1968).”
There was praise for “the virtuoso camerawork, Ennio Morricone’s rippling score and the melancholy reminder that for the young and politically engaged, the ‘revolution’ is always just over the horizon.”
