Visconti Among Stars

Alicja Helman

Abstract

Helman writes about the way Luchino Visconti used to select actors for his movies. He valued actors and offered them chances to develop their acting potential to the maximum. In a way he created actor’s emploi, and exploited the psychophysical types of stars to build characters. To exemplify this point of view, Helman analyses the expressive and spontaneo­us characters of Anna Magnani in Bellissima and We, the Women, and an exotic and distanced precise style of acting of beautiful Romy Schneider in a segment Lavoro of Boccaccio ’70 and in Ludwig. In a segment La Strega Bruciata Viva, Silvana Mangano created the image of a film star fettered by requirements set by a society, fans and the film market but she played the most interesting parts in Visconti’s movies as a mature actress (Death in Venice, Ludwig and Conversation Piece). Thanks to her cool and classic beauty, studied movements and gestures she was able to play ruthless and haughty women manipulating people. Helman portrays Claudia Cardinale whose acting technique left a lot to be desired but whose dazzling beauty cushioned all defects. Her beauty was perfectly exploited when Visconti asked Cardinale to play beautiful but hollow heroines (The Leopard and Sandra of a Thousand Delights).