Screenplay by Ken Russell
and Mardik Martin
From United Artists
Book by Brad Steiger and
Chaw Mank
Directed by Ken Russell
Starring
Rudolf Nureyev
Leslie Caron
Michelle Phillips
Felicity Kendal
Carol Kane
Seymour Cassel
Huntz Hall
By the time Rodolfo Alonso Raffaello Pierre Filiberto Guglielmi di Valentina d'Antonguella made his mark in Hollywood in 1921, his name had been changed to Rudolph Valentino and the movies' first male sex symbol came to life. His bosses had coined the term Latin lover. Neither Hollywood nor the movie-going public had ever seen anyone quite like him.
Valentino's life has been portrayed on the screen fairly successfully in 1951 with an actor, Anthony Dexter, who looked enough like him to be a relative. His story got a decent TV treatment as well in 1975 with Franco Nero, Suzanne Pleshette and Yvette Mimieux. And there's more. But my favorite will likely always be this one. And with that last sentence I take my life into my hands because this film is reviled in some circles and always has been.
It was discussed after a showing in a film class I once attended but not without yelling and swearing, cries of sitting among ignoramuses and for some, threats of banishment. In turn, I discussed that class at several parties I attended and got much the same reaction. It's not that I don't think more people liked the film at some level than those who despised it, but that latter crowd was always so emotional and spoke with such finality, rarely allowing a mere utterance of a compliment.
I know two or three people who say it's the worst movie they've ever seen. Now stop... that is ridiculous. Have they seen Fellini's Satyricon? That is the worst movie ever made. Since Americans have gone off on Valentino far more than Europeans, then let's pick the worst American movie. Burt Lancaster's The Swimmer will do until I hear something else.
The late Ken Russell directed films, as I see it, with such flamboyance and filled with controversy. He was the master of opulence... regardless of what I thought of his films, boy, were they visually stunning. He was also known for his excesses and had a penchant for scenes, frequently long ones, that are bizarre.
Frankly (and here's a nod to the other side), I very much disliked most of Russell's films. I haven't the words to describe how much I loathed The Devils and The Music Lovers, Tommy had some moments but way over the top for me, Altered States (not really like some of Russell's other projects) was fine. None of his work has moved me like Women in Love and while not moved as much, I did very much like Valentino.
Russell didn't take all the slings and arrows. Quite a few were reserved for Nureyev. On the negative side, there were the cries that he couldn't act. While Olivier needn't have felt threatened, I found the dancer to be what he needed to be. I could even make a case that his interpretation of Valentino was on the mark because he wasn't much of an actor or that he was hard to understand (sometimes that was true) but Valentino spoke in fractured English and was never known as a good actor.
The story opens with Valentino's death, the mass hysteria, over-the-top funeral and the gathering in New York of around 100,000 mourners. It was bedlam and captured well onscreen. Leslie Caron's entrance, as lesbian actress Alla Nazimova, is memorable due to what she is wearing and typical of Russell's excesses. The gown was, however, designed by the director's then-wife, Shirley.
Told in flashbacks, we learn of the actor through reminiscences shared by various people who knew him. We see his early life in America as a taxi dancer and gigolo. There's a fascinating dance with Valentino and the male ballet dancer Nijinsky (Anthony Dowell) where the former is teaching the latter how to tango. (See clip at end.)
Valentino leaves New York for California when the mob comes calling. We meet four women who had varying degrees of involvement in his life. Nazimova was instrumental in getting his movie career moving along. She had lesbian relationships with actress Jean Acker (Carol Kane) and art designer Natacha Rambova
(Michelle Phillips), both of whom were married briefly to Valentino. The union with Acker was never consummated. There was a little overlap in the marriages resulting in his arrest. Likely the most important woman in his life was screenwriter and later movie executive June Mathis (Felicity Kendal) who loved him dearly although it was a one-way street.
As a result of the arrest, Valentino and Rambova are thrown in jail. His stay there results in the film's most notorious scene where he is humiliated and his masculinity questioned. An inmate furiously masturbates as he and others deride Valentino for his sexual prowess and his famous appendage. He is denied bathroom privileges and is forced to urinate in his pants. There is no denying it's hard to watch and of course, Russell laid it on.
Valentino was always derided for being a poof which stems mainly from his effeminacy. Russell leans a little more into it than some other biographies have. Neither this film nor history reveal him actually involved with a man, yet his sexuality seems undeniable to me. Why else would a man marry not one but two lesbians? It must have been burdensome for such a man to play the great Latin (heterosexual) lover.
One of my favorite scenes (oh, could I be more transparent?) takes place in a large tent set up for one of the Sheik movies involving Nureyev and Phillips. She reads the poems of Omar Khayyam to him while they cavort in the nude. The scene became famous for two reasons. One is the frontal nudity of both stars and his roaming hands. The second reason is because the pair, who apparently hated one another and argued over their different approaches to the material, got into a bitch-slapping session. Their behind-the-scenes antics became near-daily fodder for the gossip columnists.
Then Valentino reads a newspaper article that implies he's gay. He challenges the writer to a duel which ends up being a boxing match with someone else and somehow Valentino beats the guy. He then discovers he has an ulcer. When the loser invites Valentino to a drinking match the actor again wins. But this event causes the ulcer to perforate and he dies on the floor of his home.
Valentino's brief life was over at age 31. His rise was meteoric and his death far too soon. The death of the world's most famous silent film actor (ever) caused his female fans to sob and wail in public and some committed suicide.
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| The real Valentino |
Some have complained that the ending was largely Russell's vivid imagination but I'm not so sure. I read a bio on him some years back and it made mention of the fight and that he did die of a ruptured ulcer.
We opened with all the negative stuff, some of it positively legendary. I wouldn't consider not addressing it but it is not my position. Sure there are some flaws but I have always immensely enjoyed this movie.
We know I love bios and mix in some Hollywood history and a little gay and now COME ON, why would I not like this? Oh yes, back when movies were just starting, when one could get by with most anything, when actors weren't usually all that talented, when greedy producers and money grubbers came out of the woodwork, when it was all so new and adventurous... damn, I loved it.
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| Director Ken Russell |
Adding to the jazz age theme, Russell and gang have provided such an appropriate musical score, gorgeous costumes and stunning sets. Obviously that adds up to a visual treat of a movie. Russell knows how to provide a lush experience.
The film cannot be faulted for its great sense of time and place. It is erotic, seductive, sometimes campy, satirical and over the top. Russell's cynicism for Hollywood, idols, image and such caught my attention.
I regarded Nureyev to be insufferably snotty, self-absorbed and self-important and I usually ignored him when I could. I am not a balletomane. If he is one of the best or the best ballet dancer ever, so be it. But I thought he was pretty ideal casting and his acting was respectable and generally what it needed to be. If he fell short here and there, I didn't really care.
And why not? Again I compare it to Valentino himself. I didn't think he was anything special as an actor. He was apparently a good dancer and Nureyev certainly brought a dancer's sensibility to the role. I think Nureyev probably understood they had a number of things in common... outrageous fame, a mocking press, drooling fans, skeptics' hate, sexual deriding/hiding/interests, misunderstood, worshiped, controversial, extravagant. Migawd, they both went by the name Rudi/Rudy and in public only by last names. Of course, Nureyev would also die young. When I think of this film in its entirety, I see it almost as much of a tribute to Nureyev as Valentino.
Finally, I liked what the makers had to say about manhood and this image business, this sex symbol notion. Rudolph Valentino was Hollywood's first male sex symbol who happened to have a problem with his manhood, his image. He never thought he lived up to the hype. How awful that must have been. Of course it would be just as horrifying if it happened to a woman... and to a degree, that was so for Marilyn Monroe. And Rita Hayworth once said... men wanted to go to bed with Gilda and they woke up with Rita Hayworth.
We'll let the iconoclastic Russell have the last words and he wouldn't have it any other way. After the booing he heard after the film's release, he said it was the biggest mistake of my career and years later, after seeing another screening, he said what idiot made this?
Au contare.
Here's that clip:
Next posting:
Villainy with a B leading man
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