Word: marlone
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Inevitably, any actor who plays Kowalski has to cope with the memory of Marlon Brando in the original production. Brando not only exuded animal magnetism but also conveyed the inarticulate dignity of an animal. In the current production, James Farentino seems like a deliberate lowbrow, a slob who relishes being a slob. He comes across as meanspirited, and the scene in which he ravishes Blanche becomes a sordid rape instead of the elemental encounter implied by "We've had this date with each other from the beginning...
...Marlon Brando deserves praise for placing more importance on the plight of the Indian than on the much sought after Oscar...
THERE ARE FOUR erotic scenes in The Last Tango in Paris which are so much more honest than the rest of the film that they should be excised, and exhibited by themselves as masterful short subjects. When Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider screw standing up, or shove each other up the ass with various appendages, or play with tenderness in a bathtub scene, director Bernardo Bertolucci's only intent is to evoke passion, harsh, hot or loving --and his intention is fulfilled...
When the picture is interesting, it's because of Marlon Brando. He is good enough to make us feel emotions we really don't believe. As a 45-year-old man whose wife has committed bloody suicide (for reasons which are not at all explained), he is wrenching as he is torn between sorrow and bitterness, bawling at her corpse and berating her memory. As an experienced middle-aged stallion, he is amusing off-hand with either margarine or masochism, and as a man who had inherited a flophouse (which is also the residence of his dead wife's lover...
...those sex scenes are beautiful. All Bertolucci needs is a tough producer and a good screenplay. And I think we should be charitable to the woman who helped make his inevitable commercial success possible -- Miss Pauline Kael. It's clear that the glittering combination of a favorite director and Marlon Brando overcame, in her eyes, the poor acting and pretentiousness (which Kael usually hits on). The film seems to have struck her where she often seems to think: right between her legs. The orgasmic New Yorker outpouring remains, alas, far more intriguing than what the filmmakers have spewed forth...