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"Salò" is a film by Pier Paolo Pasolini, based on the ideas and writings of Marquis de Sade, which first hit the screen 32 years ago. The film is abhorrent, depraved and sublime.
It takes place during World War II in fascist Italy and is based in the true-to-life town of Salò, a puppet state of Nazi Germany. Libertarians of Salò, the duke, the magistrate, the bishop and the president go from village to village and kidnap beautiful youths.
The four men take the 16 children to an estate in the countryside and torture, rape, defile and destroy them. The events are presented in a very Dante's Inferno-esque fashion, dividing the deeds into four rings of hell.
Pasolini said in the documentary "Fade to Black" that "the sadomasochistic sex shows how it reduces the human body to a sellable commodity. It represents what power does to the human being, to the human body."
This is not a pornographic film; the body is portrayed as less than human, merely a receptacle for punishment.
Pasolini never saw the release of his film. The Italian was brutally murdered by a 17-year-old who accused him of being a "dirty communist." The teenager beat and ran over Pasolini several times with the director's car two weeks before the film's opening.
Salò is now available as part of the Criterion Collection. The uncut version of the film, outlawed until recently as 2000, is on the disc. The movie in its entirety has not been available since its debut. The DVD also includes three documentaries and interviews specifically for Criterion.
Star Rating: 4 out of 5
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