What’s unexpected in this image from Mauro Bolognini’s amazing, strange GRAN BOLLITO, is not the sight of Max Von Sydow as a woman. Oh no, my friends, that would not be enough to qualify for “The Unexpected”. What’s unexpected is the sight of Max Von Sydow as a CONVINCING WOMAN.
Briefly, Shelley Winters plays a housewife in fascist Italy engaged in murdering her neighbours, most of whom are played by men in drag, and turning them into soap. Yes, it’s one of those kinds of films.
The movie is in fact pretty compelling and I’d write more about it except it’s unavailable with subtitles of any kind (the Italians have yet to develop the subtitle, it sometimes seems) and so I would have to get our film benshi, David Wingrove, to translate it again. And there are so many OTHER films that need translating…
shadowplay 