Il Deserto Rosso: Film Analysis Il Deserto Rosso – Red Desert is an Italian film from 1964 directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. The plot of the film focuses on the events that revolve around Giuliana (Monica Vitti), a woman who is living a deep inner crisis. After, an attempted suicide, which is disguised as a car accident, Giuliana’s mental state is compromised. The woman is affected by continuous neurosis, which preclude her the possibility of leading a normal life. Giuliana is married to Ugo (Carlo Chionetti), an industrialist, who on the contrary, seems to have his entire life under control. The two have a child (Valerio Bartoleschi), who similarly to his father do not to understand his mother’s struggles. Giuliana to cease the emotional …show more content…
For instance, Il Deserto Rosso does not have the typical well-rounded characters that are the protagonists of Hollywood Films. Antonioni’s characters instead, look as they are not fully developed. They lead an existence devoid of feelings and appear completely passive regarding the events that are taking place. Therefore, the viewers struggle to identify themselves with the protagonist, or at least to feel empathy towards her fate. A second aspect is the narrative intransitivity. In Classical Hollywood Cinema, the events are characters driven. Moreover, the scenes are connected to each other because of the cause-effect dynamic, which is kept clear throughout the entire film. In this film, instead, things just happen, there is no a real reason for them to, and often they do not have an impact on the overall story. The narrative appears to be indigested, full of digressions and events that are uncorrelated to each other. Because of these aspects combined, the film is often perceived as uncomfortable to watch. In fact, the aim of it is not to entertain, but to provoke the audience by showing an extremist perception of the conditions that define modern societies’