Carmelo Bene

Born: 1937-09-03

The filmmaking career of Carmelo Bene (1937 - 2002) lasted from 1968 to 1973, six years out of a lengthy time spent in the theater that made Bene one of the most celebrated figures of the Italian avant-garde in the second half of the 20th century. Bene first made a name for himself with a controversial production of Camus’ Caligula in Rome in 1959. Subsequent productions retained this sense of notoriety, and Bene (like Pasolini) quickly acquired a police record. Bene, however, would come to bemoan the controversy his work created, because it attracted an audience looking for shocks and titillation, while he himself was more concerned with reinventing the vocabulary of the theater: sets, gestures, texts. Bene’s turn to cinema expanded that quest to reinvent. His films resist synopsis because, although they are often derived from narrative sources, Bene uses these sources against themselves and as a springboard for his critique of the stultifying traps of representation and interpretation. The films are wildly inventive and visually arresting on several levels: the performance styles of his actors, including eccentric movements, gestures and grimaces; the sets, costumes and makeup; the editing; and the use of the camera, with stable shots regularly punctuated by handheld camera work, extreme close ups and the occasional baroque use of zooms, dollies, cranes, elaborate pans and exaggerated camera angles. They resemble something like the work of Jack Smith crossed with the experimental Pasolini of Teorema and Pigsty. One constant feature of Bene’s work is its satire of heterosexuality. The two sexes keep trying to communicate with each other, but always fail to do so. Bene’s work constantly deflates masculinist pretenses at mastery: his male characters tend to be hapless and often hysterical, while his female characters are alternately predatory and remote, and unknowable in either case. But this satire is merely the most visible form of Bene’s revolt against convention and communication. Over and over again in the films, everyday actions become hopelessly complicated or endlessly interrupted. His characters often end up staring quizzically offscreen or even into mirrors, as if they were no more sure than we are of the meaning of what they see. Indeed, identity and by extension agency seem to get suspended, along with meaning. What is left is glorious spectacle and enigmas for the eyes and ears: endless music; babbling, stuttering text; excessive and exciting images. – David Pendleton


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Oedipus Rex

as Creonte
Released: 1967-09-07

In pre-war Italy, a young couple have a baby boy. The father, however, is jealous of his son -...

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Necropolis

as uncredited
Released: 1970-10-31

Frankenstein's monster gropes towards the awareness that his mind is a universe; Attila, naked...

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Salome

as Erode Antipa / Onorio
Released: 1972-10-20

Salome is the daughter of the second wife of King Herod. The King is infatuated with her and,...

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Umano non umano

as Self
Released: 1969-05-07

Artists and poets meet in a dreamlike space between walks and performances.

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Hermitage

as The Man
Released: 1968-01-01

Hermitage, defined by Bene as "a rehearsal for lenses", beyond any literal rendition - its...

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Our Lady of the Turks

as The Protagonist
Released: 1968-09-03

A man (Carmelo Bene) can not bear to be part of society. He considers himself a "jerk" and so...

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Riccardo III

as Riccardo III
Released: 1981-12-07

Riccardo III (da Shakespeare) secondo Carmelo Bene

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The Last Days of Humanity

as Self (archive footage)
Released: 2023-05-08

The panorama of human affairs encounters the “man with a movie camera”. His playground has no...

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Catch As Catch Can

as Prete
Released: 1967-10-26

Bob is a successful actor, but his career gets doomed by a strange phenomenon: the animal...

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Red Hot Shot

as Billy Desco
Released: 1970-03-31

Frank was removed from an investigation into Mac Brown, the owner of a pharmaceutical company,...

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One Hamlet Less

as Hamlet
Released: 1973-11-21

The "Hamlet" in this well-mounted Italian spoof is the Danish prince, not a small town or...

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BENE! Vita di Carmelo, la macchina attoriale

as uncredited
Released: 2022-12-20

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Amleto di Carmelo Bene (da Shakespeare a Laforgue)

as Amleto
Released: 1978-04-21

An experimental video variation on Shakespeare's Hamlet.

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Macbeth Horror Suite

as uncredited
Released: 1997-04-05

Macbeth, the Thane of Glamis, receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will...

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Ai Rotoli

as Self
Released: 1996-01-01

A visit to the Rotoli cemetery in Palermo, while film director Carmelo Bene reads a fragment of...

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Modi di vivere - Giorgio Colli. Una conoscenza per cambiare la vita

as uncredited
Released: 1980-01-01

Realized in 1980 for Rai 2, it recalls the main phases in the life of Giorgio Colli.

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Un'ora prima di Amleto, più Pinocchio

as Himself
Released: 1965-01-01

Backstage short documentary on Carmelo Bene’s theatre works Amleto and Pinocchio.

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Bis

as uncredited
Released: 1966-01-01

In 1966, Bene presented The Pink and the Black, his successful theatrical adaptation of Matthew...

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Tre nel mille

as Pannocchia
Released: 1971-03-06

A few days after the arrival of the year 1000, bearer of great misfortune according to the...

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Capricci

as Poet
Released: 1969-11-15

After a fight in their apartment, the story of a writer and a painter are divided. The writer is...

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Voce dei Canti

as uncredited
Released: 1998-12-01

On the occasion of the bicentenary of the birth, Carmelo Bene returns to the verses of the poet...

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Pinocchio, ovvero lo spettacolo della Provvidenza

as Pinocchio / Geppetto / Mastro Ciliegia / Grillo Parlante / Mangiafuoco / Volpe / Lucignolo
Released: 1999-05-29

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Cos'è il teatro?!

as Himself
Released: 1990-12-12

Rome, December 12th - 15th 1990.

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Hommelette for Hamlet, operetta inqualificabile (da J. Laforgue)

as Amleto
Released: 1990-11-25

A TV movie variation on Shakespeare's Hamlet. The movie is a part of Carmelo Bene's multi-medial...

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La poesia dimenticata

as uncredited
Released: 1982-01-01

Carmelo Bene reads poems by Dino Campana

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Lorenzaccio, al di là di de Musset e Benedetto Varchi

as uncredited
Released: 2003-09-01

Video registration of Carmelo Bene's play 'Lorenzaccio, al di là di de Musset e Benedetto...

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Otello o la deficienza della donna

as uncredited
Released: 2002-03-18

Produced by RAI and filmed in the Turin studios in 1979 but edited years later, in 2001-2002,...

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Bene! Quattro diversi modi di morire in versi: Majakovskij-Blok-Esènin-Pasternak

as uncredited
Released: 1977-10-27

Performance shot in 1977, in which emblematic actor Carmelo Bene, in the charming reconstruction...

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Manfred, versione per concerto in forma di oratorio

as uncredited
Released: 1983-09-12

Drama by Lord George Byron, music by Robert Schumann. Filmed at Teatro Comunale di Bologna, 1979.

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In-vulnerabilità d'Achille (tra Sciro e Ilio)

as uncredited
Released: 1997-01-01

One of the last TV performances by Carmelo Bene, from Publio Papinio Stazio and Henrich Von...

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Carmelo nei Canti Orfici

as Himself
Released: 1996-08-01

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