Director: Luchino Visconti
Cast: Dirk Bogarde, Romolo Valli, Mark Burns, Nora Ricci
Italy, 1971, 130', color, Italian with Turkish subtitles
Director Luchino Visconti's screen adaptation of Thomas Mann's Death in Venice is both a triumph of visual style and a problematic study of literature-into-film translations. One of the themes of Mann's brilliant novella has to do with the artist's recognition of the power and validity of physical beauty, and Visconti's cinematic approach conveys his understanding of this theme in every frame. The splendor of Venice, the elegance of Aschenbach's seaside hotel, the androgynous perfection of the boy Tadzio - all are photographed in a lush, unhurried manner that allows the viewer to linger on a detail or to simply absorb the richness of the scene as a whole.