An unconventional film written and directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, Last Tango in Paris (1972) strikes me as shockingly disturbing and uncomfortably perplexing, but nonetheless extremely passionate and altogether unsettling.
The opening credits curiously feature two paintings by Francis Bacon: a chubby, grotesque and rather sensual middle-aged man reposed on a red sofa, followed by a similarly deformed young woman on a chair. The man and woman appear separately, and then reappear alongside each other. This subtle introduction rightly foreshadows a drama between two strangers and the sexual tensions upon their encounter. The use of distortion and disproportionate anthropometry on what obviously seems like a recognizable man and woman reflects the notion that we never truly know that particular man and woman, and neither do they know each other: mystery lingers. They represent the male and female protagonists of the film, Paul (Marlon Brando), an American living in Paris who suffers trauma of the recent suicide of his wife, and Jeanne (Maria Schneider), a young and naive French girl. Through his characters, Bertolucci – and Brando for his spontaneous improvisations – portrays a violent struggle within the soul that oscillates between the desperation to know another (especially a loved one) and the anguish of never being able to. In this case, the tool of release and escape is not alcohol or drugs, but sex, the most intimate human interaction.
More sickening than romantic or erotic, however, the explicit scenes of nudity and perverse sex (which occupy half the film) convey enormous pain and grief, especially in Paul the aggressor. The first scene blatantly displays his frustration and despair as he shouts vulgarity amid the loud passing train. His sense of heavy disappointment and perhaps guilt and regret in his life and marriage makes him a broken man. A queer, abandoned apartment unit lures Paul and Jeanne together, almost inadvertently, which quickly turns into both a paradise and a prison for them. Within minutes after their first meeting, Paul, like a wild beast, chooses to let go of reason and civilities to indulge in his most natural masculine desires. He objectifies a stranger-lady and exercises complete control and power over her in the most debased manner. He retires from society and escapes the outside world by creating a new world of his own in this old house where Jeanne ought to submit to him. Paul, eager to understand perhaps another person, a woman, or his wife, is tired of wanting to understand. He prefers a groan or an animal noise to replace his name. No names, no information. Ignorance is freedom, temporarily for Paul, more permanently for Jeanette at the end. Yet ignorance in and of itself is isolation.
Peculiarly, the deeper their agony, the more obscene they behave, the greater they desire. While Paul and Jeanne see each other completely naked, and even enter the bodies of one another, they actually know very little about each other. In fact, the audience knows nothing substantial about anybody in the film. The unresolved remains unresolvable.
