Antonioni: Documents and Testimonials Page #5

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but also to register its resonance within ourselves.

We live in a world of research: and the researcher of emotions,

Iike every other researcher, lives in expectation.

In this sense Antonioni is modern, young,

devoted to experimentation.

He is willing to remain at hand

and open to the future.

What are the best experiments you have conducted to date?

Right now we are studying mental categories in different people,

so that we might understand cause and effect.

For instance when you see a worm climbing the branch of a tree,

you might describe it two different ways:

SlLVlO CECCATO scientist the worm is climbing the tree to eat the leaves,

or the worm is climbing the tree because it's going home...

you're seeing the same thing

but through two different mindsets;

if I can understand that selective process I will program my machine

so that it will then be able to talk.

Cybernetics, machines, mysteries of technology are all elements

that have fascinated Antonioni like a toy for a kid;

the Ravenna of Red Desert is a game

of constructions on an adult scale.

Antonioni explores the voice of figurative suggestions,

shatters the traditional symbolism of colors

and comes back to nature by way of an abstract paganism.

But the fundamental question he's asking is the following:

in this desert of great industrial landscapes, this red desert,

colored by the bleeding of human flesh,

what is the color of our emotions?

ANTONIO CERVI producer Red Desert was Antonioni's first color picture,

so it was an important event for him,

and I believe for cinematic history too;

moreover, because Antonioni paints,

so he has to think over his paintings,

about the choice of color, how to find them, to invent them.

And all of this sometimes is done artificially

or even with a helping hand from nature,

and nature doesn't always give you the colors you need

then and there - think about it.

You could say Antonioni has two distinct personalities.

Antonioni the friend you meet for dinner,

who invites you to his home, the mundane Antonioni, if you want,

you meet for coffee or a trip; and Antonioni the director.

Antonioni the friend - the everyday Antonioni, not the director -

is a very funny, endearing, intelligent man,

who understands your problems, listens to you, tells jokes.

On set he totally changes, there is no communication

between Antonioni the director and Cervi the producer,

no relationship whatsoever.

The producer does not exist, absolutely does not.

It's a question of... a question of exclusivity;

he is the one who must create, go through,

mold his work and he goes headlong

and he doesn't care about anything.

That producer might die and another one

or one hundred replace him,

still, he must go through, keep going, unstoppable.

He estranges you, then tells you

when you'll go and see the movie, then you'll understand.

FRANCO lNDOVlNA director I believe the way Antonioni is portrayed

derives from how he behaves on set.

Every time I saw Antonioni arriving on set,

I noticed in him something like a sense of unease,

as if he were to share some intimate detail of his life,

made of modesty, jealousy, and love, with so many other people,

with the operator, the grips, his assistant,

the set designers, the actors they all bring something...

something personal but obscure that...

that does not perfectly correspond to his ideas;

this is where the greatest part of his effort is rooted,

and this high concentration of his, born from the effort

of transporting every one of these people within his vision,

and the exact feeling that he has for the movie.

But this is the way they like depicting him,

'cause in everyday life Antonioni has the gift of youth -

he is extremely young - vital and modern,

contrarily to the way they want to pigeonhole him

somebody interested in reality and all of its aspects.

Somebody you can go to a pop concert with,

watch the tour of ltaly, or experimental theater.

On set, if he could, he would work hidden like a thief;

he would work with his own camera, to shoot his clouds

and build the perfect light, build the perfect actor,

that would be his ideal.

He is interested in reality in all of its aspects.

But what is the relationship between Antonioni and his actors,

and his ideas on directing?

Let's listen to Monica Vitti, after seeing her here in a scene

from After the fall, by Arthur Miller.

I know that some actors, especially foreign actors,

have defined their relationship with Antonioni as a difficult one.

Well... this is what happens to actors that are used to being spoiled

and believe they are the most important element in the movie.

It is true that for Michelangelo the actor

isn't the only important element,

but one of the elements he is dealing with while working.

In his movies there's the narrative, what needs to be said,

the photography, the landscape, and sometimes the color,

and even an object, things that have certain values

and also the actor.

Antonioni doesn't consider the actor in his traditional role,

he doesn't really rely on the intelligence of the actor,

as much as on his instinct.

Besides, I believe it is much more important

to be one of the elements of a work that

has some worth than to be the protagonist of one that has none.

Quiet, quiet now.

Move away, you move away, fine very well.

You move away but not toward me, stay with the car.

Let's try to shoot it. Quickly now, all is quiet, let's do it.

Damn it, as soon as I said it...

Speed...

Action.

Stop.

You must turn or we lose continuity, c'mon, ready?

We're shooting, go ahead.

Action.

This line, you must recite it like to yourself, not to him.

It's something you're thinking. Understand?

Let's get a

Speed.

and shoot the total eclipse of the sun.

It was suddenly cold.

And a silence different from all other silences.

The light on the land different from all other lights.

And then darkness.

Total stillness.

All I could think was

that during an eclipse

feelings cease to exist too.

Antonioni shot those images without really knowing why,

obsessing over a strange premonition;

and he will not use them

because he doesn't like explicit definitions;

they belong to the most intimate memories of an artist

who never ceases to explore the unknown.

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