In an interview conducted just a few hours before his murder, director Pier Paolo Pasolini remarked, "Maybe I'm wrong, but I'll keep saying we're all in danger." The words seemed more than fitting, as he had recently completed work on what was to be his final film, Salò, Or The 120 Days Of Sodom. It's been 50 years since Salò was released, and it still carries with it a fair amount of controversy and misinterpretation. Decried by some as being nothing but pornographic and vile to the senses, others look at Pasolini's vision as an allegory for power and consumerism.

Adapted from The 120 Days of Sodom, written by the Marquis de Sade and described by its author as the "most impure tale ever written," Salò transports de Sade's text to fascist-occupied Italy in the closing days of the Second World War. While the time period is different in Pasolini's adaptation, the themes...