Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini
14 Episodes
Pier Paolo Pasolini’s ability to simultaneously embrace conflicting philosophies—he drew from Marxism and Catholicism; and he lived a thoroughly modern, openly gay life while looking to the distant past for inspiration and comfort—was matched by the multifariousness of his artistic output as a filmmaker, poet, journalist, novelist, playwright, painter, actor, and all-around public intellectual. Outside Italy, though, he remains best known for his restless and subversive body of film work. After scripting the sly sexual satire IL BELL’ANTONIO, he soon moved to directing, applying Catholic iconography to gutter-level tales of street life like MAMMA ROMA, which gave Anna Magnani one of her greatest roles as a middle-aged sex worker. From there, the outspoken and always political Pasolini’s films became increasingly scandalous—even, to some minds, blasphemous—from the Orson Welles–starring short LA RICOTTA and the stark reimagining of the Christ story THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW to the shocking savagery of PORCILE and the extravagantly bawdy medieval tales in his Trilogy of Life (THE DECAMERON, THE CANTERBURY TALES, ARABIAN NIGHTS). Though Pasolini’s career was cut tragically short by his brutal, still-unsolved murder, he remains—one hundred years after his birth—one of the most revered and controversial artists of the twentieth century.
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01:03Episode 1Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini Teaser
Episode 1
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Medea
Episode 2
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1969 • Italy, France, West Germany
Starring Maria Callas, Massimo Girotti, Laurent TerzieffIn this hypnotic adaptation of Euripides’s immortal tragedy, Pier Paolo Pasolini casts opera diva Maria Callas (utterly arresting in her only film role) as the sorceress ...
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1:45:01Episode 3Oedipus Rex
Episode 3
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1967 • Italy, Morocco Starring Franco Citti, Silvana Mangano, Laura Betti
Pier Paolo Pasolini’s powerfully iconoclastic take on Sophocles’s tragedy blends eras and cultures to ...
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1:43:02Episode 4Il bell’Antonio
Episode 4
Directed by Mauro Bolognini • 1960 • Italy, France
Starring Marcello Mastroianni, Claudia Cardinale, Pierre BrasseurScripted by Pier Paolo Pasolini, IL BELL’ANTONIO is a barbed, melodramatic satire of religion, sex, and society that gives Marcello Mastroianni a chance to play slyly against his ...
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Accattone
Episode 5
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1961 • Italy
Starring Franco Citti, Franca Pasut, Silvana CorsiniPoet and painter turned filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini courted controversy with his very first feature by using Catholic iconography and liturgical music to render a plaintive, brutally beautiful p...
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1:47:10Episode 6Mamma Roma
Episode 6
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1962 • Italy
Starring Anna Magnani, Ettore Garofolo, Franco CittiAnna Magnani is Mamma Roma, a middle-aged prostitute who attempts to extricate herself from her sordid past for the sake of her son. Highlighting director Pier Paolo Pasolini’s lifelong fascinatio...
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1:33:12Episode 7Love Meetings
Episode 7
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1964 • Italy
Starring Pier Paolo Pasolini, Lello BersaniLet’s talk about sex. In this radically engaged and engaging documentary, Pier Paolo Pasolini takes to the streets, town squares, beaches, factories, and universities of 1960s Italy to solicit everyday cit...
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2:17:51Episode 8The Gospel According to Matthew
Episode 8
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1964 • Italy, France
Starring Enrique Irazoqui, Margherita Caruso, Susanna PasoliniA biblical epic that only the Marxist dissident Pier Paolo Pasolini could make, this intensely faithful adaptation of Saint Matthew’s Gospel depicts the life and teachings of Jes...
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1:29:42Episode 9The Hawks and the Sparrows
Episode 9
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1966 • Italy
Starring Totò, Ninetto Davoli, Femi BenussiWhile wandering the countryside, a pair of father-and-son vagabonds (played respectively by Italian cinema legend Totò, in his final major film role, and Ninetto Davoli) happen upon a talking crow who spou...
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1:51:30Episode 10The Witches
Episode 10
Directed by Mauro Bolognini, Vittorio De Sica, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Franco Rossi, and Luchino Visconti • 1967 • Italy, France
Starring Silvana Mangano, Annie Girardot, Massimo GirottiFive of Italy’s greatest directors contributed segments—each starring the divine Silvana Mangano—to this offbeat...
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Teorema
Episode 11
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1968 • Italy
Starring Terence Stamp, Silvana Mangano, Massimo GirottiOne of the iconoclastic Pier Paolo Pasolini’s most radical provocations finds the auteur moving beyond the poetic, proletarian earthiness that first won him renown and notoriety with a coolly ...
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Porcile
Episode 12
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1969 • Italy, France
Starring Pierre Clémenti, Jean-Pierre Léaud, Alberto Lionello“I killed my father. I ate human flesh. I quiver with joy.” Provocateur Pier Paolo Pasolini is at his most incendiary in PORCILE (“Pigsty”), a double-edged allegory on fascism, co...
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35:44Episode 13La ricotta
Episode 13
Directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini • 1962 • Italy
Starring Orson WellesPier Paolo Pasolini’s contribution to the omnibus film RO.GO.PA.G casts Orson Welles as a director attempting to make a film of the crucifixion of Jesus—all while he, the cast, and crew behave in the most un-Christlike ways ima...
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29:12Episode 14Pasolini on Pasolini
Episode 14
In this program, produced in 2023, actor Tilda Swinton and writer Rachel Kushner read from Pasolini’s personal essays and journal entries, in which he reflects on the meaning of cinema in his life and his journey to becoming a maestro of the craft.
