"Authentic" Venice: Redentore and a Tour of the Bacari

Last Redentore weekend was all about experiencing "real" Venice, so what else to do other than the baccarata?  Baccarata or giro dei bacari is for all intents and purposes a bar crawl, where--I feel silly explaining this--one goes and samples wines and food from bars especially those clustered around the Rialto. Unlike a typical English or American bar crawl however, the baccarata occurs in the day time, the idea being that these bars--the bacari--were originally a place where workers could grab cicchetti (small plates of finger foods, not unlike a tapa)  and ombra--a glass of wine--during their lunch time.  Although many now open all day to accommodate the constant hunger of the tourist, some still only serve food during lunch time, then shut down until the early evening to serve alcohol.   Sadly the heat, coupled with vast amounts of food and the very idea of drinking at noon got to us, and we couldn't make it past the third bar without simply giving up.  

Movies in Italy: A Little Romance (George Roy Hill, 1979)

First off, it is a bit ballsy, if not foolish and misguided, for Mr. Hill to refer to his own movies in an effort to show the "Hollywood" that stands for American culture to Europeans. It is then not surprising that he includes a depiction of a self-absorbed American director in his film, either as an absolution from his pride or an inside joke that he himself may not have understood. Regardless--notable for popularizing the legend of kissing in a gondola passing under the Bridge of Sighs during sunset to ensure everlasting love, A Little Romance's strength lies not on merely solidifying the romantic allure of Venice, but on emphasizing the child-like naivete of Venice's draw. The two young protagonists--who try all they can to cross the border from France to Italy to seal their love in Venice before getting separated--act like adults acting out childhood fantasies. They are thirteen year-olds talking about Heidegger and worrying about food, but snaps into attention when told by a charming man played by Lawrence Olivier about the possibility of eternal love. This comparison between the cold reality of life and the warmth of a romantic fantasy is mirrored by the difference between business-minded and crowded France and easy going Italy, where even a misfired gun directed towards a spastic priest is met with laughs rather than concern. Italy is portrayed as a place where children can be children and adults are forgiven for being responsible. It could have been an insulting premise, but instead of being about an exoticized idea of Italy, the story is more about the lovers and how Italy is transformed to fit the story these lovers are trying to construct. We don't see "Italy," but the process in which we as foreign visitors construct our ideal world grounded on the stuff Italy is made of. Ultimately, just as it is true for the rest of us, these lovers did not see Verona, only the story of Romeo and Juliet; and they did not see Venice, only the promise of eternal love. Their, and our, earnestness forgives our heady silliness.  

Venetian Mardi Gras

Carnevale in Venice has always been associated with upturning expectations. Laws were excused for a couple of weeks of fun, people wore masks to disguise class or cultural distinctions, and the lower and upper class alike roamed the streets and openly criticized and caricature anything and everything. In light of this, it is quite a folly to come to Venice bound with certain expectations of the festival, thinking it genteel and restraint compared to the raucous that typically characterize New Orleans or Sao Paolo's celebrations. I came with such preconceptions, and was expecting a night of mask-wearers roaming the streets enacting the dream-like atmosphere promised by the brochures.

There is a lot of that sure, but walk away from the lagoon and San Marco and things become different. The alleys get more crowded and the atmosphere becomes more like a street party. There are makeshift dance parties around drummers and bands and the occasional portable bar. Unlike the usual rococo gowns associated with the festival, the costumes are more hand-made: men in women's underwear and fairy wings, holding toilet plungers; big groups wearing painter overalls with top hats; cyclists in glowing helmets. a fellow partier, who was (sadly) very popular with the ladies, was wearing a Berlusconi mask and a shirt that said "Maniaco Sessuale". He was mobbed everywhere we went, followed by the chant "Silvio, Silvio! Va' fa' un culo!" There is no unity in anything--whatever you can get together is what you wore that night.

There were those famous costume balls I'm sure. But down in the streets it got too crowded to think about those. Honestly, I have never seen Italians like this: an out and out street party, binge drinking, and dancing...everywhere! Usually discrete, it seemed like for a day every Italian decided to be Spanish. Around the Rialto, the traditional home of the best nightlife in Venice, one rounded a corner and a DJ set was happening and Big Bird was headlining. Students from Padova, Bologna, and Ferrara were everywhere, making for a hip and overindulgent crowd too young to give a damn. Crowded, sweaty (even in sub-30s cold), loud, and dizzying...very, very far indeed from the promises of a "restrained" Venetian Carnevale.

The night of course gets very weird and surreal in a place like this. The more intoxicated the crowd (and the stronger the smell of marijuana) became, things got weirder and weirder. Every beginning to a narration of the night's events seems like the beginning of a joke."So an angel, an Indian, and a sexy nurse gets into a car driven by the devil"..."we almost hit a transvestite Tina Turner walking down the road"...It's just weird, or may be its just impossible to describe. Or maybe its just not meant for descriptions. You see a mad doctor, santa, and Tom Brady peeing in the Grand Canal...does one even bother to ask, "why?"

Movies in Italy: The Talented Mr. Ripley (Anthony Minghella, 1999)

*This series is to introduce you to the various films that were either set in Italy or were made in Italy, discussing how we as outsiders view the country and how Italians view themselves, and how this is expressed and experienced through the art of cinema

The Talented Mr. Ripley is an all-around movie that you could relate to whatever it is that’s bugging you at the moment: the role of women in a patriarchal society as seen in Marge’s character; Tom’s shape-shifting but ultimately tragic homosexual; Dickie’s invincibility and invisibility afforded to him by his privilege; even the rift between classical and modern music representing the coming social rift represented by the 60s. But for me what appealed is the Italy portrayed, and how it represents the Italy most expect when they visit the country. I think the movie tries to parody the self-absorbed relationship that the upper-class visitors has to Italy, but only unconsciously. There’s drama ,conflict, murder, but all of which have nothing to do with Italy or its people. A side-story about a tragic love-affair with an Italian woman was the closest these characters had at actually perceiving the country beyond their rose-colored spectacles, but even then it was easily dismissed as an element that revealed Dickie’s true character, without regard to the largely perfunctory and silent female character. The film have a lot of village scenes and postcard-pretty shots of Rome, Venice, and Sanremo, but it’s so remote to the story that I often questioned if the scenes were set in a sound studio. It’s like the film crew was on vacation, and they just needed to prove that they were there. There was no direct way that the scenery was engaged, no efforts to make the obviously staged market and street scenes more believable, not even to make the obviously exotic locales more palpable in their alieness. It might as well have been just another serial killer story set in Cleveland.