I had seen “The Name of the Rose” at a very young age, maybe when I was 10 or 12. What stuck in my mind wasn’t the powerful images, the great actors or the exciting plot, but rather that heavy sex scene between the young, innocent, naive Adlatus Adson (Christian Slater) and a nameless, dirty, wild girl (Velentina Vargas). That was of course a maximum revelation for a little boy – I wouldn’t have been nearly as surprised at seeing aliens: so that can happen to stupid girls too?
The rose never left me
In retrospect, this encounter of the fourth kind was, funnily enough, also the starting point of one lifelong connection with “The Name of the Rose”, especially with the author of the book on which the film is based: Umberto Eco. A few years later I read that same novel and other books by him. At some point later – like Eco at the beginning of his career, which I did not know at the time – I started studying literature and was surprised to discover in the university library that Eco had written much, much, much more than ‘just’ “Novels.
The man is actually a media scientist and semiotician and started a second career as a writer at the age of 48 with ‘De Naam van de Roos’. The emphasis is on “second career”, because despite global success, Eco has not given up his other areas of work. The author-scientist, who died in February 2016, was incredibly productive and left behind an extremely extensive oeuvre that you will not necessarily find in a regular bookstore. And I thank him for that, because the essay ‘Journey to the realm of hyperreality’ from the 1985 collection ‘About God and the World’ was particularly useful during my studies!
But of course, ‘The Name of the Rose’ still has a special place in my heart to this day, which applies to both the novel and the film adaptation.
Umberto Eco’s biggest mistake
Eco was a great intellectual from whose work you can learn an incredible amount – but for a long time he was simply completely wrong about one thing: he hated the film adaptation of his book so much that he later gave Stanley Kubrick the film rights to his book. second novel, which quoted Annaud’s adaptation “The Foucault Pendulum” (1989), did not sell.
Only in his later years did he find peace with the monastic crime thriller, which was incredibly expensive for that time and for a European production (the budget was 17.5 million dollars), which not only tells about mysterious murders committed by the Franciscan monk William von Baskerville (Sean Connery) and the aforementioned Adlatus Adson, but the history of its production is actually linked to a murder that remains unsolved to this day. Half of the film rights belonged to Gerd Lebovici, a filmogul and publisher from Paris who was found murdered in an underground parking garage on March 5, 1984.
Different from the book, but still great!
It was of course clear to Annaud that the novel would have to sacrifice a lot for the film adaptation, but he still managed to remain faithful to the spirit of the original: while historical films until now have only used the Middle Ages as a setting. for classic literary themes or modern stories, Actually, the theme here is the Middle Ages, an authentic setting with associated motifs that are embedded in the crime plot. This leads to a dispute between secular and religious views or it casually points out the great divide between the wealthy clergy and the poor population.
Visually, the event is decorated in beautiful, unforgettable imageswhich – with incredibly accurate features – brought the dark, dirty, brutal Middle Ages to life like no other film before it and even now, some three and a half decades later, draws viewers deep into a world long gone. Extremely impressive and of course even more intense on the big screen, where, combined with rich Dolby sound, the full appeal of this fascinating world can unfold.
THE ‘BEST OF CINEMA’ SERIES – PRESENTED BY FILMSTARTS
In a flawless 4K restoration, this classic of European cinema now returns to theaters as part of the ‘Best of Cinema’ revivals. On December 5, 2023 “The name of the rose‘ can be seen again on the big screen in selected cinemas for a day and thus marks the conclusion of this year’s film series, which we support as an official media partner.
But supplies are already in sight. StudioCanal recently announced the new top titles “Best of Cinema” for the first half of 2024, which we present to you in the following article:
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Source : Film Starts
I am Dawid Malan, a news reporter for 24 Instant News. I specialize in celebrity and entertainment news, writing stories that capture the attention of readers from all walks of life. My work has been featured in some of the world’s leading publications and I am passionate about delivering quality content to my readers.
