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| Director Paolo Sorrentino |
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| Sorrentino with lead actress Celeste Dalla Porta |
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| Sorrentino with cinematographer Daria D’Antonio |
PARTHENOPE B+ Italy France (136 mi) 2024 ‘Scope d: Paolo Sorrentino
Are you aware of the disruption your beauty causes? —John Cheever (Gary Oldman)
A visually mesmerizing cinematic puzzle that is thematically elusive, this is the second film Sorrentino has shot in Naples, his beloved home city, following the more autobiographical The Hand of God (È stata la mano di Dio) (2021), which won the Grand Jury Prize (2nd Place) at the Venice Film Festival. Situated on the Bay of Naples in southern Italy, where Mount Vesuvius, a still-active volcano, can be seen off in the distance, the omnipresent force of the sea is the one constant that affects everyone in the city, beckoning with its mysterious allure. In Greek mythology, Parthenope aroused the jealously of the goddess Aphrodite, who, as punishment, decided to turn her into a mermaid, and was one of the three sirens whose songs enraptured Odysseus, but when she failed to entice him to shore (he was tied to the mast), she threw herself into the sea and drowned, where her body washed ashore, where beauty, passion, and death intertwined to give rise to what we know today as Naples, which is sometimes called Parthenope after the siren, while one of the city’s universities is also named after her. Inspired by the fleetingness of beauty and youth, the sensuality on display is nothing less than stunning, shot in ‘Scope by Daria D’Antonio (also born in Naples), who shot his previous picture, where every shot is a work of art, explored from all angles, while extraordinary costume and musical choices add more layers of emotional resonance to this intoxicating experience. The film is one continual male gaze at the hypnotic beauty of a girl actually born in the sea, Parthenope (Celeste Dalla Porta in her movie debut), as we follow her, and her heightened presence, through different phases of her life from the 1950’s to the present day, much of it feeling like a dream projection of every man’s fantasy, also Sorrentino’s first film starring a female protagonist, given a mythic stature, a devotion to form over function, aesthetics over usability, making her seem more of an object of study than a compelling character. Drop dead gorgeous, with esoteric shades of Fellini and Antonioni, radiant beauty is always the first thing you see, but there are also powerfully provocative undercurrents that hit viewers in the face, actually becoming contentious at times, where there is a Beauty and the Beast aspect of this film, which can be understood in a multitude of ways, with suggestions that beauty is only skin deep, that once young faces will change one day. The maker of THE CONSEQUENCES OF LOVE (2004), Il Divo (Il divo: La spettacolare vita di Giulio Andreotti) (2008), This Must Be the Place (2011), 2014 Top Ten List #5 The Great Beauty (La Grande Bellezza) (2013), and Youth (2015), a director with a distinctive style, where seven of his eight features have premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, Sorrentino’s films have always been extravagant and dazzlingly stylish, showing a keen eye for detail, often revealing the moral rot lurking below the seductively glittering surfaces, with no one else making films like this, yet his latter films have grown more intensely personal, as the poetic lyricism of the film becomes something that needs to be experienced rather than understood, inviting different interpretations. And this film is no different, bathed in luxuriousness, delving into the city’s 60’s and 70’s history, yet it’s harder to pinpoint just what’s going on under the surface, creating a mysterious unknown, surrounded by everpresent cigarette smoking, where a frequently asked question posed by different characters is “What are you thinking about?” No answers are forthcoming until the very end of the film when Parthenope has aged, played by Stefania Sandrelli, who was such a prominent force of Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Conformist (Il Conformista) (1970). This film is to Naples what THE GREAT BEAUTY was to Rome, both films opening with a quote by French novelist and physician Louis-Ferdinand Céline, “Of course, life is huge. You get lost everywhere.”
More than a conventional narrative, this film operates more as an abstract metaphor on the anthropological art of “seeing.” According to Sorrentino, “Naples is a city that belongs to my emotions. Every day, Neapolitans reinvent their lives, they decide that life should surprise them, and I want to tell it that way.” Parthenope’s brother, Raimondo (Daniele Rienzo), says “It is impossible to be happy in the most beautiful place in the world.” That same thing might be said of his younger sister, as all eyes follow her wherever she goes, a force of nature in her youth, dazzlingly beautiful, where Sorrentino puts viewers in her shoes, allowing us to experience her intoxicating allure and the effect this has on people, perhaps best expressed in this sequence, accompanied by the equally enchanting music of Polish composer Wojciech Kilar’s Exodus, PARTHENOPE Soundtrack Exodus - Wojciech Kilar YouTube (3:58), which is lush and liberating, creating an enormous amount of unresolved tension that can be disturbing, yet also awe-inspiring. While there appears to be a parallel between myth and Parthenope’s story, encapsulated by the city of Naples itself, where the sun is always glimmering against the deep blue sea, her haunting beauty is described as “disruptive,” whose mere presence disrupts the world around her, where her stunning appearance is both her gift and her curse, as people become entirely consumed by her presence, having an overwhelming fixation with her, easily objectified, as men stop and stare, while women look on with envy or curiosity, becoming, in effect, our collective idea of beauty, leaving her struggling to find something real she can hold onto. Yet despite all this attention, she remains emotionally inert, unable to truly grasp happiness or any meaningful intimacy, delving into the freedom of youth, the mystery of eroticism, a life full of possibilities that open up and then close, reflecting the impossibility of understanding “the other.” It’s important to note that in this steamily romantic scene with two guys, one of whom is Sandrino (Dario Aita), the son of one of the many maids in the house where she grew up, Parthenope di Paolo Sorrentino | Clip dal Film YouTube (1:05), it’s startlingly reminiscent of a similar scene in Christophe Honoré’s Seventeen Times Cécile Cassard (Dix-sept fois Cécile Cassard) (2002), specifically this extraordinary dance sequence, 17 fois Cécile Cassard - Christophe Honoré Bande annonce YouTube (2:13), only in this case one of the two men vying for her love and attention is her older brother Raimondo, apparently blind to “the consequences of love,” where the platonic yet incestuous element is more than a little unsettling, like a Greek tragedy. Sorrentino bashes the audience with these extreme contrasts, where euphoria is often mixed with intentional discomfort, as the world is always a bit off-kilter, where no judgments are made in a dream, yet that rapturous element lingers in every frame of this film, where the music offers its own interior commentary of heartbreaking melancholy that can be chillingly prescient and poetic, “Everything was already foreseen,” "Era già tutto previsto" di Riccardo Cocciante YouTube (4:15), which Sorrentino allows to play in full. The inner life of this impenetrable protagonist remains distanced and highly ambiguous, which some may assume is superficially slight, a gorgeous empty vase with nothing inside, contending this is a shallow exercise, all surface with little substance, or is it instead a vessel waiting to be filled, where contradictory emotions can transform into something deeper than itself, as her life is meant to be mysteriously uncertain, resistant to easy interpretation, recalling what is arguably the most debated shot in Yasijirō Ozu’s career, as seen in Late Spring (Banshun) (1949), a sequence that cuts between Noriko’s face and an empty vase, where her mood changes significantly from joy to tears, while the vase remains unchanged and timeless, like the incessant waves of the ocean, YouTube (8:25).
Coming from a wealthy, well-cultured family with a staggering view of the water, Parthenope is a breathtakingly beautiful, free-spirited woman, where the film is comprised of segmented episodes of her life, including a carefree, picture-perfect Capri summer, where love is always in the air, going to exclusive parties, or an outdoor picnic with a rich businessman who persistently hovers above in his helicopter until she accepts his invitation, PARTHENOPE (2024) - Official HD Scene Clip - In Cinemas ... YouTube (1:55), with fleeting encounters with various men who get drawn in by her physical charms, including her own brother Raimondo, Parthenope di Paolo Sorrentino | Clip dal Film YouTube (45 seconds), discovering the dizzying freedom in the art of seduction, where she may be a victim of her own beauty, as his obsessive infatuation leads to a fatal passion. It was Goethe himself who immortalized the phrase, “See Naples and then die.” Her more surreal experiences include a nighttime walk among the Spanish quarters populated by prostitutes and decay, or witnessing a gambling den that becomes a theater of “fusion” between two Camorra families, featuring a fearfully innocent, naked young couple having a public sex ritual that is little more than a spectacle. At one point, she meets gay alcoholic American writer John Cheever (Gary Oldman) on holiday in Capri, who reminds her, “Beauty, like war, opens doors,” yet refuses to allow her to get drawn into his sordid world, defiantly telling her, “I don’t want to steal even a moment of your youth,” but perhaps, most significantly, her life turns by discovering her intellect, where knowledge becomes part of her mystery, developing a professional relationship with a sullen university lecturer, anthropology Professor Marotta (Silvio Orlando, from Naples), who acts more as a father figure than her own father, taking her under his wing and allowing her to excel. After being discovered in a local hotel restaurant for her beauty, however, she decides to give acting a try, referred to an eccentric acting coach Flora Malva (Isabella Ferrari), whose face remains hidden behind a veil after botched plastic surgery, while also meeting an embittered film star, Greta Cool (Luisa Ranieri, from Naples), who despises Naples and excoriates Neapolitans, despite being from there, both embodying the soul crushing effects of fame and notoriety, with Parthenope deciding that frivolous life is not for her. But nothing is more improbable than her blasphemous encounter with a lecherous Bishop (Peppe Lanzetta, from Naples)), whose less than pious debauchery expresses how little the church actually matters anymore, becoming more of a public spectacle than a matter of religious faith, asking her “Do you love too much or too little?” Driven by a desire to understand miracles, once perceived as miraculous herself, she seeks to understand the very forces she embodies, a disruptive force that typically normalizes over time. Puzzled by the swirl of contradictory behavior, where even the church is predatory, she returns back to the professor, Parthenope di Paolo Sorrentino | Clip dal Film YouTube (36 seconds), becoming his assistant, where a life of academia awaits, a world where beauty and superficialities have no place, whose essential foundation is built upon ideas, where she can have the same effect upon the next generation as the professor had on her, literally opening up her life in new ways, where teaching offers the possibilities of a new future, growing more introspective, studying the very mystery she once represented. With an unexpected dose of magical realism that imposes a childlike vision of wonder, the film has a tendency to meander at times, jumping through various timelines, with Stefania Sandrelli inhabiting her later years, as youth has finally abandoned her, exposing greater self-awareness and vulnerability, something we haven’t seen before from her character, yet there’s something in her philosophical forthrightness that sticks with viewers, like knowing your worth and finding your authentic voice, or answering a question with a question, Parthenope di Paolo Sorrentino | Clip dal Film YouTube (36 seconds). A hymn to beauty and eternity, a love letter to a city, yet more than anything this film is an epic journey, an existential treatise on the fragmentary moments that shape one’s life, where certain things remain in our memory while others simply vanish, drawing viewers into a sacred relationship with memory and the passage of time.
Note
The film is dedicated to Luca Canfora, the film’s costume designer, who died under mysterious circumstances on September 1, 2023 as filming started to wrap up. His body was found in the waters off the island of Capri, initially ruled a suicide, but his family expresses skepticism and disputes this contention, urging greater investigation, Death imitates art as film designer’s body washes up on shores of Capri.
