1. An important point about Antonioni’s ‘
2. I feel that the stance posed by ‘Red Desert
3. Though Antonioni did celebrate that humanity has the power
to master and control nature, he was not at all oblivious to the consequences
of that. He was indeed viewing the issue in a very realistic stance. As he
stated in another interview, each era has demanded sacrifices upon which other
things were built. There is no evolution without crisis. Antonioni appreciated
the problem that arose from any form of progress, and demanded the audience not
to retreat or run away from them. Before we think about the big questions,
let’s deal with a bit of psychology first.
4. Giuliana seemed to have the ability to see things in a
unique way. Yet, the heightened sensation might just be subjective (and
probably delusional) point of view from Giuliana, suggesting she might have
some form of mental illness. Antonioni, on the other hand, did not provide any
clue about an impartial perspective, therefore the audience has no clue whose
(or which) point of view was the correct one that points to reality? Certainly,
this was the style that Antonioni employed in many of his films, as an allusion
to Nietzsche’s philosophy.
5. And, I believe there is a vision that Antonioni has been
always delivering, much like that of Dreyer and Bergman as I will discuss in
later articles – that in real life there is only a thin line because vivid
imaginations and potential psychosis. When you see something so different from
other people, as Orson Welles would have put it, ‘he / she is either a genius
or a complete idiot’. Moreover, it is rather ironic that Giuliani’s idealistic
thought - the island she was mentioning in her story was the only one that
seemed to reconcile with any attributes grounded in reality, as least the way
the audience would find comfortable with. The colors in the sequence were
natural, not deliberately deformed or heightened in any way.
6. Objectively, Ugo, Giuliana’s husband, was quite concerned
that she has probably contacted some sort of mental illness and therefore she
was not acting quite right. Worse still, Giuliana was distressed by a nightmare
involving herself sinking in quicksand. This aspect is interesting because it
reminds me of another 1964 film from the East, Hiroshi Teshigahara’s ‘Woman in
the Dunes’, which I have talked about before. That film was also surrealistic
and dealt with existential issues, and I am not sure that is a mere coincidence
or maybe there is some inspiration between the two. The content of the dream
was not random, it was quite deliberate. When Giuliana was hospitalized before
that, she heard an anecdote from a woman that she was afraid of drowning
because she felt that was no ground beneath her, as if she was sliding down a
slope. Later on, when courting with Corrado, she expressed that she couldn’t
look at the sea – though she liked the feeling of it – because she would lose
interest on the land - which was what her issue seemed to originate. This is a
very nice analogy because the very act of ‘drowning’ was like the unquestioning
and conformity to the situations people found themselves in. Giuliana seemed to
be aware of the existential ennui, no matter how sick she might be judged by
psychiatry, that she had to get away from this turmoil.
7. What is quite obvious, though, was that Giuliana’s real
issue originated from her isolation and alienation from the world around her.
Not only the modernizing environment has led to her distress, she found it hard
to find a true and lasting relationship from others, including her family. The
people around her might have offered some possible distractions – sex,
politics, material possessions, or mindless RPGs – but any of them would not
lead to a better status for her. She had the responsibility to figure it out
for herself.
8. The memorable fog scene signifies the existential angst of
many characters of Antionioni’s films in general. In the scene, characters
appear and disappear amidst the fog, as if not certain of who they are, and
what their individual identities lead them to. The very fact that the
characters are widely separated in the scene separated the inevitable loneliness
inside every one of us, the isolation inherent in the individualism of
humanity. This memorable scene was Antonioni’s poetic portrayal of the human
condition we must all confront at some point.
9. Corrado, who was Ugo (Giuliana’s husband)’s business partner,
was an interesting character. While he was not a model character – there were
no model characters in an Antonioni film – he was at least concerned with
Giuliana’s plight and was willing to connect with her. Like everybody else, he
was also in a state of alienation, but he was a bit more open to interact with
his surroundings and has always attempted to look for a solution. He told Giuliana
"You wonder what to look at; I wonder how to live." So, he was
exploring the attitude to live for a meaningful life. His voyage to Argentina
10. Antonioni disagreed. He felt that the right attitude was not
to long for the more primitive times, with the belief that it was a more
natural landscape for man. Nor was it to escape from the painful condition. This
is best illustrated in the final minutes of the film. When Giuliana and Valerio
were walking near his husband’s industrial plant, a stream of exotic yellow
smoke was shooting out. And while Valerio wondered whether the birds would be
harmed by the poisonous smoke, Giuliana gave an answer that showed she was
enlightened regarding her situation. The birds did not just escape or never
came back, rather, they figured out a way to get around the poisonous smoke, so
that they could be suited to the ever-changing environment. Antonioni believed
this flexible attitude was something that we had to develop to meet the changes
we encounter in the modern age.
11. Antonioni also believed in hope from the younger
generations, like Bergman in ‘The Silence’. Giuliana’s son, Valerio, had a
fascination with the robot toy, and his attitude was more open to changes than
the other characters. Regarding the robot, that’s a scene where the ambiguity
has led to contradictory interpretations from the viewers. The robot
accidentally switched his direction and repeatedly crashed into a wall, without
the people noticing it. After the light of the room was switched off, the only
visible aspect was the robot’s shining eyes. Antonioni appreciated that this
scene was meant to be open to interpretation, though he did not want the
viewers to feel that the scene had a negative outlook suggesting the technological
direction was leading humanity to a dead end. Rather, he pointed out that
because in the dark the shining eyes of the robot was the only source of
illumination, it could be the thing that could assist humanity to a better
outcome. Because Valerio could easily accept this new toy, he would be more
equipped to face the many changes that he would eventually encounter in his
adulthood.
12. With ‘Red
Desert
(2/2)
Film Analysis
