Notes for an African Orestes

The late Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini (The Gospel According to Saint Matthew) made this curious visual notebook for a film set in Africa, based on Aeschylus's Oresteian trilogy. Apparently abandoning the project (Pasolini made a string of erotic adaptations of literary classics in the early 70s), this pastiche of images filmed in Tanzania and Uganda, along with Pasolini's voiceover narration is all that remains. After briefly recounting the story of Orestes, Pasolini explains his interest in exploring the metaphorical connection between the conclusion of the Oresteia--which witnessed the birth of democracy in Greece--and the contemporary situation in the recently independent African nations. Camera rolling, Pasolini roams the villages and countryside in search of actors and actresses and suitable locales. This, the first third of the film, is interesting. Suddenly, Pasolini announces that he has decided to make a musical, and the scene shifts to a recording studio where jazz musician Gato Barbieri, a handful of musicians, and two singers commence to delivering an obnoxious cacophony of near-random noise that doesn't shed one ray of intelligible light on Pasolini's would-be film (but did have the singularly noticeable effect of driving my dog out of the living room, howling in protest). This musical (?) interlude is followed by disturbing footage of the Biafran war (including a filmed execution). Moving into its final third, Pasolini is seen questioning a group of African university students about the appropriateness of the Orestes legend to contemporary Africa. Their answers look interesting (or at least their faces do), but since the answers are neither translated nor subtitled, we have no idea what's being said. Pasolini's "notes" take a little while to wear out their welcome (less time if you're a canine), but finally the efforts expended in trying to stick with the film are not repaid. Not recommended. (R. Pitman)