Caught In A Bad Romance

The Night Porter (Liliana Cavani, 1974)

Call me an old romantic, but I'm a sucker for a love story that tugs at my heartstrings like Alabama and Clarence. Liliana Cavani's dark, psychological drama The Night Porter (1974) is anything but a conventional love story, but leaves an intense impression on me, regardless. 

A sadomasochistic relationship founded in the most monstrous annals of Second World War history is enough to turn most people away. The emotional bond between Max, a former S.S. officer turned night porter and Lucia, a survivor in his concentration camp, is the stuff nightmares are made of. Max, played brilliantly by Dirk Bogarde, is completely and utterly in love with the waifishly demure Lucia (Charlotte Rampling). A chance r-encounter with her while employed as a night porter in a post-war Viennese hotel, reignites his old feelings for her once again. Lucia's feelings for Max are what makes the film so intriguing to me. Partly attributed to her finding 'love' in the atrocious hellhole she is placed in, and also, her destructive desire to relinquish her current life and relive her past. Fatalism at its finest.

"Danke schön, darling, danke schön
Save those lies, darling don't explain"

 Other than Max's worried Nazi chums forcing our couple to be imprisoned in his apartment, I really don't want to dwell too much on further plot details, because as important as they are, the real focal point for the film was the psychological makeup of Max and Lucia's relationship. Call it Stockholm Syndrome, or whatever shrink diagnosis, I personally found it fascinating, how any kind of 'loving' relationship could be formulated via such a monsterous origin. In one particular scene, the viewer is witness to physical scarring on Lucia's body, so one could hazard a guess, her mental submissive state was attained via physical torture. There's also a scene where Max presents to her a gift box with a decapitated head in it. During this scenario, Max is giggling like a mischievous school boy, awaiting her reaction. The film's finale conveys acceptance from our protagonists, as they are dressed in the clothes of their true selves. Max and Lucia stop hiding in the dark and step into the cold light of a new day.

"It means nothing to me
This means nothing to me
Oh, Vienna"

 

Superstar critics like Pauline Kael and Roger Ebert gave this a critical mauling labelling it exploitative and pornographic, but I think what they chiefly overlooked was our protagonists' relationship was built around the concept of insanity. Breaking it down into a digestible ready meal of outrage, plays into the hands of misinterpretation. Prior to The Night Porter, Cavani had worked on archival material from the war, where she came to the conclusion, that extreme events creates extreme behaviour. This is a point that resonates for me; we might be sane now, but if we were thrown into those evil and depraved events, would we truly remain unchanged by it? Not even going to pretend that I totally understand a character like Lucia (sincea her damage was deep enough for her never to have a real future), but I do accept mental and physical trauma does play a heavy hand in molding us as adults. It's how we deal with it that matters the most.

"Hold it down boy, your head's getting blurred
I know you can't stop thinking of her"