Vaghe stelle dell’orsa (Sandra)

The beautiful Sandra (Claudia Cardinale) returns with her husband to her hometown of Volterra, where her father – a Jewish scientist who died in a concentration camp – is to be honoured. The reunion with her mother is frosty, while that with her brother is more affectionate than propriety allows. Family tragedy and despair in the crumbling upper class: Visconti's leitmotifs in an elegant, opaque arrangement. Often interpreted as a ‘modern Electra’ because of its ingredients of betrayal and incest, the creator himself characterised it as a crime thriller ‘that is different from a normal crime thriller’: everything is clear at the beginning, everything is dark at the end. The visual virtuoso Visconti surpasses himself in his play with mirror images and concealment, the lure of darkness – while the original title evokes the sparkling stars with a line from a poem by Giacomo Leopardi. (C.H.)