25/02/2013 - Retrospective features extended runs of The Gospel According To Matthew and Theorem

The British Film Institute (BFI) Southbank, in association with Luce Cinecittà, Rome, and Cineteca di Bologna, will launch the most comprehensive retrospective of films by Pier Paolo Pasolini ever seen in the UK. This two-part season that runs March 1 till April 30 will feature all 13 of Pasolini’s features – including Mamma Roma (1962), Medea (1969) and Salò (1975) – and most of his shorts, documentaries and collaborative works alongside events and a study day. Many of these celebrated films will be shown in recently restored versions. The season will feature extended runs of The Gospel According To Matthew and Theorem.

Pasolini (1922-1975) was a director, novelist, poet, linguist, painter and journalist with an outspoken political agenda. Each of these aspects informed his filmmaking and the intellectual brawls that led him to frequent troubles with the courts. He was expelled from the Italian Communist Party as a young man and the clash between his non-aligned leftism and homosexuality reverberates through many of his films. His interests in philosophy, psychoanalysis and anthropology led him to rethink some of the founding myths of European identity – both Christian and pagan – while his roots in the neo-realist movement displayed his delight in ignoring the rules of conventional film grammar.

The season is organised by the BFI along with Camilla Cormanni and Paola Ruggiero - Luce Cinecittà; Roberto Chiesi - Fondo Pier Paolo Pasolini at Cineteca di Bologna; and Graziella Chiarcossi (Pasolini’s sole heir); and supported by the Ministry of Culture of Italy in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute, London.