An adaptation of nine stories from Boccaccio's "Decameron".An adaptation of nine stories from Boccaccio's "Decameron".An adaptation of nine stories from Boccaccio's "Decameron".
- Awards
- 1 win & 3 nominations
Jovan Jovanovic
- Rustico
- (scenes deleted)
Maria Gabriella Maione
- Una madonna
- (as Gabriella Frankel)
Pier Paolo Pasolini
- Allievo di Giotto
- (as P.P. Pasolini)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe Decameron (1971) is the first film in Pier Paolo Pasolini's "Trilogy of Life," continuing with The Canterbury Tales (1972) and concluding with Arabian Nights (1974). Each film was an adaptation of a different piece of classical literature focusing on ribald and often irreligious themes. The tales contain abundant nudity, sex, slapstick and scatological humor.
- GoofsWhen the Mother Superior seduces the deaf-mute boy, he's sleeping in a tomato garden. Tomatoes are a New World crop that wouldn't be brought to Italy for another two centuries.
- Quotes
Allievo di Giotto: Why create a work of art when dreaming about it is so much sweeter?
- Alternate versionsAlthough the cinema version was intact the 1988 UK Warner video was cut by 22 secs by the BBFC to remove shots of naked genitals during the bedroom sex scene with the nun. The cuts were fully restored in the 2001 BFI DVD release.
- ConnectionsEdited into Porn to Be Free (2016)
- SoundtracksFenesta Ca Lucive
Written by Guglielmo Cottrau, Vincenzo Bellini and Giulio Genoino in 1842
Performed by Franco Citti
Sung by Ser Ciappelletto and his Neapolitan hosts in Germany. Also sung by one of the Neapolitans to a monk.
Featured review
A Night at the Dreams
There are at least hundreds of reasons why I like Il Decameron so unbelievably much, a film that, in retrospect, always feels like a whole night of various kinds of wonderful dreams. First of all, there is this incredible variety of faces and characters in those stories and episodes that are both, alternating comic and tragic. I especially love the episodes with the three brothers and their poor sister, the one with two "nightingales" on the roof top, the side plot with Franco Citti and, of course, the self-ironic part which Pasolini plays himself. I also like the two big long shots à la Bosch and Giotto (with my woman Silvana Mangano as Madonna in the latter). I like the film's rich choral fresco, the joyful and sensual atmosphere which surrounds the often bitter fate of the characters, the transformation of literary and cinematic material to an impudently carnal and physical matter, which consists of erections, stomachaches, hunger, excrements. I like how the film laughs about life and sexuality and frequently meets death.
There's always a constant, circuiting movement where all characters are driven by the desire to improve their living conditions and to fulfill their wishes. While doing so, they come to know betrayal and disappointment and therefore reckon with the reality of a world that is mean and unfair to them. There are the rich and the poor (such as Lisabetta and her brothers and Lorenzo), the smart and the naive, the saints and the sinners, the self-pleasing and the troublemaker. Those crowd scenes that often connect the episodes of all these swarming people and colours, where always a special incidence of light, a striking gesture of a figure, an effective angle catches the eye, are especially beautiful. And finally there's the cut with these smooth counterparts of environment and human figure, of static takes and wild tracking shots (i.e. the wonderful chase in the woods of Lorenzo and the three brothers with its sudden standstill, the transition of the lightness of the play to an ominous shadow). And the shots of Ninetto silently dancing himself outside the church or Lisabetta hugging the plant pot with tears running down her cheek are the ones I will never forget.
There's always a constant, circuiting movement where all characters are driven by the desire to improve their living conditions and to fulfill their wishes. While doing so, they come to know betrayal and disappointment and therefore reckon with the reality of a world that is mean and unfair to them. There are the rich and the poor (such as Lisabetta and her brothers and Lorenzo), the smart and the naive, the saints and the sinners, the self-pleasing and the troublemaker. Those crowd scenes that often connect the episodes of all these swarming people and colours, where always a special incidence of light, a striking gesture of a figure, an effective angle catches the eye, are especially beautiful. And finally there's the cut with these smooth counterparts of environment and human figure, of static takes and wild tracking shots (i.e. the wonderful chase in the woods of Lorenzo and the three brothers with its sudden standstill, the transition of the lightness of the play to an ominous shadow). And the shots of Ninetto silently dancing himself outside the church or Lisabetta hugging the plant pot with tears running down her cheek are the ones I will never forget.
helpful•51
- spoilsbury_toast_girl
- Aug 31, 2009
- How long is The Decameron?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Release date
- Countries of origin
- Languages
- Also known as
- Decameron
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross worldwide
- $839
- Runtime1 hour 51 minutes
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content