Senso

Senso is a 1954 film adaptation of Camillo Boito's Italian novella, Senso, by the Italian director Luchino Visconti, with Alida Valli as Livia and Farley Granger as Lieutenant Franz Mahler (a name change for the Remigio Ruz character and Visconti's tribute to Gustav Mahler, one of his favourite composers whose music features in the later Death in Venice). Originally, Visconti wanted Ingrid Bergman and Marlon Brando for the starring roles but the ... more

Senso is a 1954 film adaptation of Camillo Boito's Italian novella, Senso, by the Italian director Luchino Visconti, with Alida Valli as Livia and Farley Granger as Lieutenant Franz Mahler (a name change for the Remigio Ruz character and Visconti's tribute to Gustav Mahler, one of his favourite composers whose music features in the later Death in Venice). Originally, Visconti wanted Ingrid Bergman and Marlon Brando for the starring roles but the producer denied it. Both Franco Zeffirelli and Franco Rosi, later well-known film directors in the their own right, worked as Visconti's Assistant Directors. The film is not very faithful to the novella because Visconti pushed Livia's story into the background, while giving more detail to the war itself and introducing a new subplot about Livia's nationalist cousin, who leads a rebellion against the Austrians. In the film, it is his money that Livia gives away to her lover, leading to a dramatic massacre of the Italian partisans, an episode... less