Anniversary of The Adventure
On May 15, 1960 at the Cannes International Film Festival, the premiere of Michelangelo Antonioni's film "L'avventura (The Adventure)" took place.
At the premiere, the film was booed by the audience. They found the film immoral and obscene. Michelangelo Antonioni and Monica Vitti even had to defiantly leave the cinema so as not to hear the whistle and insulting laughter about the film. But already at repeated viewing the same audience appreciated it quite favorably. So favorable that the film was awarded a special jury award "For a new film language and the beauty of its imagery", paired with Kon Ichikawa's Japanese film "Kagi (Odd Obsession)". (By the way, later, based on this Japanese film, Tinto Brass directed his film "La chiave (The Key)", in which Stefania Sandrelli shone).
Perhaps it was the initial "inadequate reaction of the refined public," as Russian film critic Yevgeny Nefyodov called it, that prevented Antonioni's film from receiving the main award of the film festival - the Palme d'Or, which as a result, went to another Italian cinema masterpiece - the film "La dolce vita" directed by Federico Fellini. However, among the relative "losers" of the festival, along with "L'avventura (The Adventure)" were "Ballad of a Soldier" by Grigory Chukhrai, "Le trou (The Hole)" by Jacques Becker, "Jungfrukällan (The Virgin Spring)" by Ingmar Bergman. Yes, and the movie “Неотправленное письмо (Letter Never Sent)” by Mikhail Kalatozov could have appeared if the Soviet filmmakers had not withdrawn the application.
A year later, the film "L'avventura (The Adventure)" by Michelangelo Antonioni participated in the competition for the British BAFTA Award in the nomination Best Foreign Film, but the victory was awarded to Billy Wilder's film "The Apartment".
Most film critics praised the release of the film with laudatory reviews. But the New York Times film reviewer Bosley Crowther in this case turned out to be true to himself and erupted in a very malicious snout. "WATCHING "L'Avventura" ("The Adventure"), which came to the Beekman yesterday, is like trying to follow a showing of a picture at which several reels have got lost. Just when it seems to be beginning to make a dramatic point or to develop a line of continuity that will crystallize into some sense, it will jump into a random situation that appears as if it might be due perhaps three reels later and never explain what has been omitted. At least, that's how it strikes us.What Michelangelo Antonioni, who wrote and directed it, is trying to get across in this highly touted Italian mystery drama (which is what we take it to be) is a secret he seems to be determined to conceal from the audience. Indeed he stated frankly to a reporter from this paper last week that he expects the customers to search for their own meanings. "I want the audience to work," he said.That would be all right, if the director would help us a bit along the way, if he would fill in a few of the big pot-holes in this two-hour-and-twenty-five minute film." However, many times we had the opportunity to verify the obese and biased nature of this film critic. Otherwise, why would he work in a newspaper that is the mouthpiece of the US Democratic Party.
But, by the way, maybe the point is not in the maliciousness and obtrusiveness of the columnist of The New York Times, but in, so to speak, the infantility of his intellect? After all, even Roger Ebert, who rated the film 4 stars out of 4 possible and included it in his list of "Great Movies", admitted in his 1997 review: "I did not much connect with the film when I saw it first--how could I, at 18? These people were bored by a lifestyle beyond my wildest dreams. When I taught the film in a class 15 years later, it seemed affected and contrived, a feature-length idea but not a movie. Only recently, seeing it again, did I realize how much clarity and passion Antonioni brought to the film's silent cry of despair."
The above-mentioned Evgeny Nefyodov, who has an amazing ability to discern the political background in the most seemingly apolitical films, revealed the deep meaning of this film: "Antonioni's "adventure" turns out to be akin to the "border situation", at some points making you feel the immediate proximity of death ... And this, in turn, allows the authors to identify the “fragmented consciousness” of not only individuals, but also of the society they represent and in which they occupy not the last places. It’s wider to reveal contradictions, while in latent form, which will truly reveal themselves almost a decade later, resulting in violent socio-political protests. Parting with previous illusions about the world order and lack of strength to gain new views. And as the consequence - the doom to remain in a state of total confusion, which, according to the director, “is the truth of the film. Uncommunicativeness.”
In the USSR, the film was not shown.
67% of IMDB and Kinopoisk users gave this film a rating from 8 to 10.
Based on the above, the rating of the film "L'avventura (The Adventure)" according to FilmGourmand was 8.192, which allowed it to take 478th place in the Golden Thousand.
