Liliana Cavani's La pelle: Debunking the Fake Promises of Postmodern Sexual Emancipation and the Silencing Effect of Cultural Oblivion

Abstract

This essay traces the connections between the zeitgeist of the early 1980s and Cavani’s film La pelle, by putting special emphasis on issues of aesthetics, politics, and sexuality. By recounting the history of the book which inspired the film and by illustrating Cavani’s choices of adaptation, the essay illustrates the Italian director’s rendering of master/slave relationship into the sexual sphere and highlights the transformation of this relationship in late capitalist societies. In addition, by looking at Cavani’s female characters and fetishistic imagery, the analysis demonstrates Cavani’s ability to offer a layered image of Italian women, while pointing to new forms of erotic magnification and racial objectification. Finally, the analysis questions the director’s gaze and her position as a female director in the Italian society of the 1970s and 1980s, also demonstrating that Cavani’s relegation to oblivion is the result not only of her distance from the Italian moral standard but also of her isolation within the increasingly sexist system of Italian Cinema.