Case (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
case) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomsecrets2010-02-04 05:21 pm
case) wrote in fandomsecrets2010-02-04 05:21 pm
[ SECRET POST #1126 ]
⌈ Secret Post #1126 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
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Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 078 secrets from Secret Submission Post #161.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 1 2 3 4 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ], [ 1 - take it to comments ], [ 1 - posted twice ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
OP
(Anonymous) 2010-02-05 12:30 am (UTC)(link)See, I don't know much about its overall reception; the only way I'd heard of it, and the only discussion I'd read of it (prior to watching), was via my flist, where opinions generally touch on "pointless drivel" to "total wallbanger" to "pure exploitation with zero artistic merit," and are scathing all around. I can see why they think and feel as they do—and I don't mean that it's because they lack Artistic Sensitivity, or some crap—but I do think it qualifies as art. Not exactly a towering work of art, but art, i.e., more than just cinematic masturbation.
Being in something like the same camp as Catherine Breillat makes me want to punch myself in the face, but there it is.
And not nearly half as "sick" as the book.
So I understand, but I can't say that de Sade's original sounds more impressive for that. (Sooner or later, I'll probably read it to know for myself.) I've only read other de Sade novels, so I could be missing a lot, but what struck me overwhelmingly about Salò is that it seems less a response to Fascism (or capitalism, or even nihilism) than a response to de Sade and his idea of—or more like attempt at—extravagance. What's horrific about Salò isn't the excesses, or the particular scenes of torture, but the… the… the way it's so desultory. The four "libertines" act almost like robots following a recipe—like they've heard of this concept of lust and so they're going to (unlustily) sit down and devise the most textbook expression and indulgence of it there's ever been. The real debauchery consists in order and the death of desire, not chaos or impulse. When there's nothing you particularly want, then all is permitted. It's simply something to do.
It's horrifying, if you recognize even a sliver of yourself in it.
TL;DR, it's the embodiment and showcasing of that hollowness that I think makes it art and was worth filming, not the finger it gives to Fascism. Other works have addressed the political topics and done it better. Whether Salò was ethical to create is another issue; I don't know what conditions were like on set or how all participants felt about it, but I was stunned when I saw just how young those kids were.