Film L’INNOCENTE (THE INNOCENCE) by Luchino Visconti

Italy, France 1976/ Director: Luchino Visconti/ Cast: Giancarlo Giannini, Laura Antonelli, Jennifer O’Neill, Rina Morelli, Didier Haudepin a.o./ 125 min. original language/ from 16 years

Count Tullio Hermil lives a life without compromise: When his affair with the widowed Count Teresa Raffo becomes public and socially exposes his wife Giuliana, their comfortable marital arrangement begins to falter. Although both are allowed liaisons with others, the count is consumed by jealousy when his wife falls for the writer Filippo d’Arborio. In this dramatic love story, Visconti uses Gabrielle D’Annunzio’s novel (L’innocente) to reveal the double standards of the Roman aristocracy during the Belle Époque. To mark the 50th anniversary, we take a critical look at his last feature film.

Luchino Visconti (1906 – 1976) was an Italian theater, opera and film director. His work had a decisive influence on European cinema: classics such as THE LEOPARD (1963), DEATH IN VENICE (1971) and ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS (1960) earned him numerous nominations and awards. In his films, he explored the themes of beauty, decadence and death as well as the decline of the European aristocracy, to which he himself belonged.

WITH INTRODUCTION: Barbara von Machui