Last Tango in Paris (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1972)

[hearthesilence]

I don't think anyone else is disputing it either.

Obviously, but now my original question's been buried.

[mfunk9786]

Whether actual penetration took place - listen, I get it - I just think it's a very similar situation being discussed whether or not it's the case. Didn't mean to give you the impression that I thought you were saying it was suddenly made acceptable if penetration didn't occur, but continues to seem beside the point to me

[Mr Sausage]

Whether actual penetration took place - listen, I get it - I just think it's a very similar situation being discussed whether or not it's the case. Didn't mean to give you the impression that I thought you were saying it was suddenly made acceptable if penetration didn't occur, but continues to seem beside the point to me

It's not beside the point if the point is to determine precisely what happened. It may or may not be beside the point if the point is to feel negatively about it.

Considering that people seem to be getting the impression that Maria Schneider was forcibly sodomized against her will on camera, and are broadcasting that impression to a wide audience, it's important to look closely at what those involved actually said, especially Ms. Schneider herself. And I think doing that is important, because we've already had too much these days of people allowing their strong emotional reactions to justify all kinds of abuses to truth and common sense. Saying 'in the end it hardly matters what precisely happened to Ms. Schneider so long as we agree it's bad' is doing her a disservice. I imagine the reason she came out publicly was to set the facts straight about what happened to her and how she felt about that. I don't imagine that she'd be happy if what got around was different from what she said--whether that difference made it sound better or worse.

All of us have already agreed that this is a disturbing and deplorable thing. There's no point in confining discussion to endless reiterations of that. That just turns into hollow purity tests. Discussion has to be opened up elsewhere: to what we are able to know about this situation, to the reaction this is causing and the implications of that, to what this says about the power dynamics of movie-making, or power dynamics in general, etc. We can have positive, valuable discussions there.

[spectre]

Agreed with the above. There are most certainly gradations of sexual assault. A court of law would recognise that, so there's no reason why we shouldn't.

I'm surprised no-one (here or in general) has dealt with the question I posted on the previous page of whether the film should be censored or banned in light of this. It's hardly a radical proposal and I suspect some jurisdictions (such as the Australian classification system) might well consider it in future. I think that's a fascinating and troubling line of discussion.

[gcgiles1dollarbin]

I would respond that we not only have to preserve the film itself and make it available to the public, but we also need to document and preserve the context carefully and thoroughly, enforcing and clarifying the circumstances surrounding the event. So no: don't ban or censor it. It will serve society in the future as a vivid example of what reprehensible garbage could occur on the male-dominated sacrosanct film set in the name of art. To suppress that would be to deny its existence, which is precisely why we preserve racist content in older films. I think preservation, availability, and careful documentation would also serve as an act of respect towards a woman who has had the courage to accuse these powerful men of behaving criminally, with nothing to gain but ridicule, equivocation, and pshaws from a lot of people--a woman who has died without anyone involved admitting to the accuracy or severity of her accusations.

[Brian C]

I think any new releases of the film should have text crawling along the bottom of the screen during the butter scene that says "In her later years, Ms. Schneider expressed feelings of pain and humiliation in regards to the methods used by her director and co-star during the filming of this scene. If you are enjoying this scene, it means you are an asshole. Go die in a fire, asshole."

That should make everyone happy - people still get to see the movie, but are properly shamed in the process.

[calculus entrophy]

Perhaps that was the director's implied intent?

[gcgiles1dollarbin]

I think any new releases of the film should have text crawling along the bottom of the screen during the butter scene that says "In her later years, Ms. Schneider expressed feelings of pain and humiliation in regards to the methods used by her director and co-star during the filming of this scene. If you are enjoying this scene, it means you are an asshole. Go die in a fire, asshole."

That should make everyone happy - people still get to see the movie, but are properly shamed in the process.

I think that's too severe and wouldn't make anyone happy, if I can take what you're saying seriously for a moment. Making sure that people have access to the fact that a sexual crime was committed on a film set is not the same thing as ordering them to feel ashamed about it (or making them feel partially responsible simply because they enjoy the movie).

The production of art is complicated and fraught; sometimes shitty things are done in order to create it. Given that, certainly the least we can do is remember those shitty things in perpetuity and honor the people who were treated like garbage by protecting an accurate account. I realize a non-consensual butter assault isn't the Rwandan genocide, and probably not even a legally defined rape, but the denial by key players in this case is strong enough that it risks being forgotten over time without a certain level of exacting precision with regard to the details and conflicting claims. The fact that this is a conspicuously public example of the epidemic tendency to trivialize sexual assault claims makes it all the more important to remember Schneider's accusations beyond her death.

Perhaps that was the director's implied intent?

He certainly intended it to be a deeply disturbing scene; "enjoying" it as a viewer would be a remarkable feat of disassociation. The art is successful even if the means to achieve it are cruel and criminal.

[spectre]

(sorry to bump this old thread and respond to a two-year-old post, but obviously this is back in the public eye now that Bertolucci has croaked, and I think there is a lot of discussion still to be had about it.)

He certainly intended it to be a deeply disturbing scene; "enjoying" it as a viewer would be a remarkable feat of disassociation. The art is successful even if the means to achieve it are cruel and criminal.

Unfortunately, it seems like people did enjoy it, given the locker-room-style guffawing about butter that accompanied references to the film in decades afterwards. People can have a cruel streak and get off on seeing simulated or even real footage of people being hurt or humiliated. We all know that. And that means that you can't really control how people react to a given scene, or necessarily always fall back on intent as the only relevant factor.

I also wonder about this idea that the film should be preserved purely as a warning about the harms of sexual assault and a male-dominated film industry. I see the logic, but would Schneider have wanted this footage to be used this way? Did she ever consent to it being seen into perpetuity as some kind of educational tool? And, as an ethical principle, shouldn't sexual assault victims be able to have some control over what happens to footage of their assault?

I don't agree with the suggestion (if it's to be taken seriously; I presumed it was a joke) about the film being released with a disclaimer running over the screen. That's silly and just an attempt to didactically tell people what to think (imagine if the only way to see Birth of a Nation was with a watermarked disclaimer saying "this film is racist" – I mean, really!). I support Last Tango in Paris remaining available and fully intact (say, in university libraries and archives) to specialists interested in the history of cinema, because that's important, but I do wonder about the ethics of commercial exhibition (through DVD sales and rep theatre screenings). I'm not saying I have a firm view that it should be banned/censored, but I think it's something that needs to be discussed in earnest, because the likelihood is that any future attempt to screen it in the English-speaking world would be picketed:

https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/mo ... 4yzwp.html

[Brian C]

Well, yes, obviously my suggestion of a disclaimer was a joke. But I also think that, even as a joke, it's a better idea than reserving the film exclusively for "specialists."

[spectre]

Do you think there are any cases in which a film should be withheld from commercial distribution on ethical grounds? I would have thought we could all imagine at least extreme cases where we’d support such a move (child exploitation, snuff films and the like), so it seems to me that it’s less about principle than where one draws the line.

[swo17]

And who draws the line

[spectre]

Ideally it’d be government, right (through its organs such as the BBFC and the Australian Classification Board*)? I mean, that’s the only method I’d trust (I have no time for distributors self-censoring; see Devils, The).

*For those of us who don’t live in libertarian wonderlands...

[MichaelB]

The BBFC isn’t a government body - it’s an independent organisation founded and funded by the film industry to act as a flak-catcher on its behalf.

[spectre]

Thanks for the clarification, Michael! I wasn’t aware of that (my presumption was that it was more or less equivalent to the Australian/NZ classification boards, which are government departments).

I do think, in any case, that either an industry self-regulating body like the BBFC or a government review board would easily be able to make a call on Last Tango, although in some cases might potentially need provisions added to deal specifically with filmed exploitation. Either way, it’s not fundamentally different from existing processes.

[hearthesilence]

As for her “a litle raped” claim I think she makes it perfectly clear herself she was not physically assaulted let alone actually sodomized but that she came to regret doing the scene and felt ashamed of doing it and felt it detracted from her career and persona...The sequence was planned even blocked for the long take.

This came up yesterday, where it was claimed that 1) the whole scene, not just the butter, was never scripted and that it was all a complete surprise sprung on Schneider and 2) that she was penetrated. Even when I corrected these bits, (and when countered with "no, she said she was," I mentioned "I know the inteview you're talking about, did you actually read everything she said?") it was blatantly dismissed because they clearly made up their minds that it was rape. Look, using the butter and smearing it on her behind or leg without saying something was taking advantage of Schneider, and even Bertolucci wished he had reached out for forgiveness before Schneider died, but there's an enormous difference between that and what apparently quite a few people now believe.

[domino harvey]

I think hearthesilence is relaying an IRL conversation he had with someone who said the above

[hearthesilence]

I think hearthesilence is relaying an IRL conversation he had with someone who said the above

Yes, this.

[spectre]

^ I think that's a fair point, and I agree that there's a certain prurience in the way people are talking about this film. It is a shame that Schneider's performance can't be celebrated and that she is conceived of now wholly as a victim (as if the entire fact of her acting in this film, rather than a single scene in which she was taken advantage of, were a form of victimisation). There's definitely stuff to discuss around that.

[Crimlaw25]

Interesting take on the ever controversial Last Tango in Paris.

[rrenault]

So the decision of the Cinémathèque Française to screen this on Sunday as part of a Brando retrospective is causing quite a ruckus due to the butter scene controversy. I find this odd since there wasn’t a peep following Imprint’s recent choice to release it on Blu-ray. Also, I seriously doubt this is the first rep screening of the film to occur in Paris in eight years. I’m sure it’s been screened at some point at one of the rep houses in the fifth and sixth arrondissements in recent times. I could be wrong though.

[hearthesilence]

So the decision of the Cinémathèque Française to screen this on Sunday as part of a Brando retrospective is causing quite a ruckus due to the butter scene controversy. I find this odd since there wasn’t a peep following Imprint’s recent choice to release it on Blu-ray. Also, I seriously doubt this is the first rep screening of the film to occur in Paris in eight years. I’m sure it’s been screened at some point at one of the rep houses in the fifth and sixth arrondissements in recent times. I could be wrong though.

Film Forum is screening it as part of their retrospective celebrating Brando's centennial, and they have a disclaimer for it on their website.

[beamish14]

So the decision of the Cinémathèque Française to screen this on Sunday as part of a Brando retrospective is causing quite a ruckus due to the butter scene controversy. I find this odd since there wasn’t a peep following Imprint’s recent choice to release it on Blu-ray. Also, I seriously doubt this is the first rep screening of the film to occur in Paris in eight years. I’m sure it’s been screened at some point at one of the rep houses in the fifth and sixth arrondissements in recent times. I could be wrong though.

Film Forum is screening it as part of their retrospective celebrating Brando's centennial, and they have a disclaimer for it on their website.

Some people were so incensed by the American Cinematheque’s screening a few years ago that they launched a petition on social media to have it pulled

[hearthesilence]

So the decision of the Cinémathèque Française to screen this on Sunday as part of a Brando retrospective is causing quite a ruckus due to the butter scene controversy. I find this odd since there wasn’t a peep following Imprint’s recent choice to release it on Blu-ray. Also, I seriously doubt this is the first rep screening of the film to occur in Paris in eight years. I’m sure it’s been screened at some point at one of the rep houses in the fifth and sixth arrondissements in recent times. I could be wrong though.

This Facebook post from Cinémathèque Française is 12 hours old, but I just saw it. The comments section give an idea of what rrenault is talking about.

[MichaelB]

It's very funny seeing navel-gazingly oblivious cinephiles pop up going "Great photography by Vittorio Storaro" in the middle of impassioned debate about what Storaro was filming.