A Certain Realism

Pier Paolo Pasolini (1922-1975) was arguably the most complex director of postwar Italian cinema. His films - "Accattone", "The Canterbury Tales", "Medea" and "Salo" - continue to challenge and entertain new generations of cinema audiences. A leftist, homosexual and distinguished writer of fiction, poetry and criticism, Pasolini once claimed that "a certain realism" informed his filmmaking. Combining analyses of Pasolini's literary and theoretical writings with critiques of his films, Maurizio Viano offers a thorough study of Pasolini's cinematic realism, in theory and in practice. He argues that homosexual themes are present in these films in a manner that critics have thus far failed to acknowledge.