Pier Paolo Pasolini
40th Anniversary

November 4 - 22, 2015

On the 40th anniversary of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s (1922-1975) death, Pera Film in collaboration with the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Italian Institute of Culture in Istanbul is organizing a film program commemorating him and his work. Pasolini, a filmmaker, a poet, a novelist, a playwright, a painter, a critic and intellectual, was not only one of Italy’s most prominent figures for much of his life, he remains that, but, more importantly, he is a figure who belongs to the world.

Pier Paolo Pasolini’s ability to simultaneously embrace conflicting philosophies—he was both a Catholic and a Marxist; modern-minded, openly gay; who looked to the distant past for inspiration and comfort. What he is best known for is undoubtedly his subversive body of film work. He was a student of the written word, and among his earliest movie jobs was writing additional dialogue for Federico Fellini’s Nights of Cabiria (1957). Soon he was directing his first film, Accattone (1961), a tale of street crime whose style and content greatly influenced the debut feature of his friend Bernardo Bertolucci, La commare secca (1962), for which Pasolini also supplied the original story. The outspoken and always political Pasolini’s films became increasingly scandalous—even, to some minds, blasphemous—from the gritty reimagining of the Christ story The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964) to the bawdy medieval tales in his Trilogy of Life (1971–1974). Tragically, Pasolini was found brutally murdered weeks before the release of his final work, the grotesque, Marquis de Sade–derived Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom (1975) provides a violent essay on Italy's Nazi-fascist past and still is one of the world’s most controversial films. Writer Ed Vulliamy, in his Guardian article meticulously remarks: “Pasolini had died, so history insists, as though in a scene from one of his films. ‘It is only at the point of death,’ Pasolini had said in 1967, ‘that our life, to that point ambiguous, undecipherable, suspended – acquires a meaning.’’’

This program’s screenings are free of admissions. Drop in, no reservations.

In collaboration

 

November 4

19:00 Accattone

November 6

19:00 Love Meetings

Love and Anger: The Sequence of the Paper Flower

21:00 The Grim Reaper

November 7

14:00 Oedipus Rex

16:00 The Hawks and the Sparrows

November 8

14:00 Mamma Roma

November 11

19:00 Accattone

November 12

19:00 The Gospel According to St. Matthew

November 13

17:00 Prophecy: Pasolini's Africa

19:00 Notes Towards an African Orestes

21:00 Oedipus Rex

November 14

14:00 The Rage of Pasolini

16:00 The Gospel According to St. Matthew

November 15

14:00 The Grim Reaper

17:00 Notes Towards an African Orestes

November 18

19:00 The Hawks and the Sparrows

November 21

12:00 Love Meetings

Love and Anger: The Sequence of the Paper Flower

14:00 The Rage of Pasolini

16:00 Prophecy: Pasolini's Africa

November 22

14:00 Mamma Roma

Accattone

Accattone

Oedipus Rex

Oedipus Rex

The Hawks and the Sparrows

The Hawks and the Sparrows

The Gospel According to St. Matthew

The Gospel According to St. Matthew

Love Meetings

Love Meetings

Mamma Roma

Mamma Roma

Love and Anger: The Sequence of the Paper Flower

Love and Anger: The Sequence of the Paper Flower

The Grim Reaper

The Grim Reaper

Notes Towards an African Orestes

Notes Towards an African Orestes

The Rage of Pasolini

The Rage of Pasolini

Prophecy: Pasolini's Africa

Prophecy: Pasolini's Africa

Program Trailer

Pier Paolo Pasolini
40th Anniversary

Pasolini, a filmmaker, a poet, a novelist, a playwright, a painter, a critic and intellectual, was not only one of Italy’s most prominent figures for much of his life, he remains that, but, more importantly, he is a figure who belongs to the world.

The Success of an Artist

The Success of an Artist

Pera Museum presents an exhibition of French artist Félix Ziem, one of the most original landscape painters of the 19th century. The exhibition Wanderer on the Sea of Light presents Ziem as an artist who left his mark on 19th century painting and who is mostly known for his paintings of Istanbul and Venice, where the city and the sea are intertwined.

Memory of Objects

Memory of Objects

In his book exploring the cultural history of souvenirs, Rolf Potts discusses how such objects assume meaning through personal stories: Objects turn into memories with the stories they hold.

Midnight Horror Stories: The Last Ferry <br> Galip Dursun

Midnight Horror Stories: The Last Ferry
Galip Dursun

I remembered a game as I was waiting in the passenger lounge for the ferry to arrive just a few minutes ago. A game we used to play at home when I was young, in my country that is very far away from here, a relic from the distant past; I don’t even remember how we used to play it. The kind of game that makes me feel a thousand times lonelier than I already am among the crowd waiting to get on the ferry.