Customer Reviews

Identification Of a Woman - (Mr Bongo Films) (1982) [DVD]

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

It's churlish to complain that Identification of a Woman isn't the equal of L'Avventura, La Notte, Red Desert, Blow Up, Zabriskie Point, or The Passenger. If it was, it would be a masterpiece of European art cinema. While it perhaps falls a little short of those Antonioni high points, it's nonetheless an intriguing and beautiful piece of work in its own right. The customary Antonioni themes - the elusiveness of desire, the fragility of identity, the mysteries of visual perspective, the unreliability of knowledge - are explored in typically elliptical and aleatory fashion, and lead towards a characteristically inconclusive but bafflingly moving ending. And along the way there are scenes that are the equal of Antonioni's best for mood, atmosphere and sheer cinematic creativity and skill. Niccolo and Mavi's drive into the fog is a scene of brilliant mystery and power. Their climb up the stairs of a swanky villa to an elite Roman soiree is an object lesson in how to use the camera and editing to generate a sense of foreboding and philosophical unease out of the simplest of materials. Niccolo and Ida's voyage out onto a Venetian lake is a gorgeous metaphor for their unfathomable relationship. And if anyone can tell me what that mysterious object in the tree - to which Antonioni keeps drawing us back - outside Niccolo's window is all about, I'd be grateful. The animated final scene of the film, which some viewers find a let-down, is brilliant - almost the equal in conception and weird appropriateness to the endings of Blow Up or Zabriskie Point. This is a film which improves with every viewing and ought to be embraced as the last significant work of a great master.

This is an obscure, latter day film by Antonioni, the last one he made before suffering a stroke that incapacitated him, and left him with no voice. It's not a particularly memorable one. The only scene I vividly recall is a traffic jam scene where the protagonist (a film director) is searching for the said woman in the title on a fog shrouded freeway. It's an astonishing scene, but it's really the only memorable scene in a 132 minute film. Antonioni pretty much lost it after The Passenger (some have said he lost it after Zabriskie Point, which is definitely debatable), and while this film has such excellent Antonionish moments, it's not a really memorable film. A shame.

Anthony and others should please note that european PAL-television DVDs that have all-region coding CAN be played on any Personal Computer with a DVD drive in the United States.

When shopping for DVDs there are two features to check: TV format and region coding. The US has NTSC TV format and Europe has PAL TV format. Additionally the US region code is number 1 and the Europe region code is number 2. Some DVDs have all-region coding which means they will play anywhere in the world.

US DVD players are NTSC TV format. If you have a PAL DVD like "Identification of a Woman", you can watch it on your portable computer or desktop computer with a DVD drive. That's how I would watch it.

Whether sitting 12 feet away from my TV or 3 feet away from my portable computer, the viewing area of the movie is the same size to my eye. Enjoy.

Michelangelo Antonioni take interests in an accurate presentation of a woman, Daniela Silvera, not so much seen ever after, and especially in Tomas Milian, who finds there his best part. Perhaps the most intimate film of Antonioni and yet his simplest.

Identification of a Woman is an Italian film about an Italian director. I find the director, Niccolo (Tomas Milian), to be an interesting character as he is both artistic and intelligent, yet not a push over. The story begins when Niccolo gets a call from a mysterious man that wants to meet with him. When Niccolo sees him, he gives Niccolo a very vague threat about continuing to see a particular woman will result in some kind of trouble. Shortly later, Niccolo begins a passionate affair with a younger woman named Mavi (Daniela Silverio). Although Mavi says she doesn't know much about Niccolo, I would say she is even more mysterious. I also found it mysterious that he got a threat about not seeing her before he met her (and I watched it three times to confirm that this is the sequence of events). In the big scheme of things, this is a minor detail and shouldn't be worried about too much.

But the mysteries only grow in this film. Mavi disappears after some time of dealing with the stalkers spying on Niccolo and having to make their affair secretive. So as intense as their passions were for each other, the flames between Mavi and Niccolo seem to be extinguished abruptly, which isn't acceptable at all for Niccolo. He is driven to find out what happened and who was behind the threats. Niccolo then meets another woman named Ida (Christine Boisson) that not only helps him put some closure to the mystery, but also becomes his new girlfriend. Ida is quite different than Mavi and presents Niccolo with a situation in which he must decide if he wants to continue their relationship.

What is fascinating about the movie is that the story is basically normal, but it is also bizarre. While everything that happens isn't too far from everyday events, they are also pretty extraordinary. I found Identification of a Woman to be a intriguing movie, but it also came up short because it left a few details unanswered. Although those these questions left in our mind may have been intentional, as they provide us with quite a bit to ponder, I still would have preferred more concrete answers.

I was terribly disappointed with this DVD. The advertising on AMAZON was not at all clear that the disk could NOT be played on US DVD players. It is not compatible with our format, and I think this should be absolutely clear on the website. It simply says FormatI cannot review the film in any way. I feel that the site implicitly misrepresented the disk. I have bee: PAL and ALL REGIONS. I now understand that the average customer is supposed to know from this that "regions" does not been all countries. It would have saved me time and annoyance if the incompatibility with US DVD players was clear.