Reflection on the film The Conformist

¶ … Conformist

Explicating Conformity

The Conformist, which was directed by the noteworthy Italian filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci, is a notable film on two fairly exceptional accounts. Not only does it manage to combine a meaningful plot with elements of psychology, politics, and social issues, but it also is visually entrancing and features astute cinematography and sumptuous scenes. At the heart of the issue that the film evaluates is the need and actual effect of conforming. The conclusion hints that there is a degree of futility in human lives, and that regardless of how much one chooses to conform or to not conform, he or she only has limited influence on the world around him or her.

Set during the turbulent years preceding and encompassing the Second World War, The Conformist depicts the journey of its protagonist, Marcello Clerici, through the various stages of his life in a series of flashbacks that regularly cut into and intersect with the present time. It does not take the viewer long to realize that this young man is making every attempt possible to conform to his contemporary society to help make up for an act of indiscretion which haunts him for the rest of his life -- when he murdered a man who attempted to rape him. In many ways, this sole fact drives the remainder of the plot -- or at least the desire of Clerici to conform to fascist Italy standards. As such, he has married an enormously dull wife -- in the attempt to be normal -- and has also dedicated himself to fascism, which was certainly more normal in the pre- and during- World War II years Italy experienced.

Still, the most interesting part of the film for this particular observer is the lengths that Clerici was willing to go to conform, none of which seemed very normative. One might understand a young man marrying a woman who is immensely boring and pedestrian in able to fit into bourgeoisie society -- so long as one does not have to do it oneself. However, conforming to the country's fascist party and attempting to murder someone certainly seems a little extreme for simply trying to fit it with the rest of society. What emphasizes this fact even more is that the person that Clerici travels to France to kill, Professor Quadri, is his former teacher. Clerici knows him personally. Yet he is willing to attempt to murder him just so he can properly exorcise the negative experience he had as a child when he was nearly raped. It is also significant to note that the young man accepts this assignment to Paris while he is on his honeymoon, which is another point of extremity. Additionally, he also becomes romantically involved with his former teacher's wife, a fact that helps to underscore what is becoming an increasingly layered degree of closeness that Clerici has with his intended victim. Again, virtually all of these aspects of the plot certainly indicate that the Clerici is going to great lengths simply to account for his childhood memory, and to prove that he is a functioning, capable member of Italian society.

Whereas the various layers of the aforementioned plot help to underscore a degree of brilliance in The Conformist in terms of its storytelling, that storytelling is immensely aided by the visual appeal of the film. Although the film takes place in the early to middle part of the 20th century, it was actually created during the 1970's. As such, there are various elements of lush photography that it includes to present a degree of stunning realism of this period time piece. The various flashbacks are all extremely lucid and driven by a montage of camera angles, which adds to the film's realism (or perhaps even its surrealism). It is also visually aided by the brilliant, chromatic sets and the realistic clothing in which the characters are outfitted. There are scenes in which the lighting seems to be every much as part of a characters as some of the actual actors, and the sets themselves are adorned with vintage, art deco style props that help to recreate this particular historic epoch.