Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #45601 in DVD
• Released on: 2001-06-18
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Dubbed in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 107 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini's film of The Canterbury Tales was one of a trilogy from the early 1970s that, like its companions The Decameron and the Arabian Nights, was an international box-office hit playing for long runs in mainstream cinemas. All of them adapt a masterpiece of literature where man becomes the moral catalyst for his own destiny. Chaucer's ribald sense of humour was a natural outlet for Pasolini's own desire to throw caution to the wind on screen, causing controversy at the time by displaying all facets of the male and female body unadorned. (Although it all looks pretty tame now, the Italian authorities were a threatening presence to Pasolini at the time.) Produced by Alberto Grimaldi with a large budget, the location scenes were filmed in many historic sites in England, notably Wells Cathedral, its crypt, and the surrounding flatlands leading toward Glastonbury, captured in early spring by Tonino Delli Colli's cinematography. The cast with Italian and English actors dubbed into Italian with English subtitles is a mixed blessing. Hugh Griffith as Sir January is one Anglo-Saxon recognisable from his role as the lecherous squire in Tom Jones, and overacts like the rest of the cast. Pasolini himself appears briefly as Chaucer in a non-speaking role that one regrets he didn't enlarge for himself in this sprawling tableaux of pilgrim's tales (Ken Russell's excesses from the same period come to mind). The musical score, an adaptation by Ennio Morricone of some traditional indigenous melodies, prefigures the early music revival by a few years and provides a stimulating soundtrack. --Adrian Edwards

DVD Description
DVD Special Features:

Italian language, English subtitles
Ratio 1.66:1

Synopsis
Six of Chaucer's classic 15th-century tales presented complete with all their bawdy humor about romance, deception and lust. Second film in the "Trilogy of Life."

Customer Reviews

Dubbing is dodgy.....
Seeing actors speak the lines in english, then have it come out the speakers in Italian, then have English subtitles is a bit convoluted but it works some of the time. I have not seen the other 2 films from the trilogy and in no way profess to be an expert on The Canterbury Tales, though I know the Miller's Tale well from school!. This segment seemed to be faithfully adapted, so i'm sure the rest are pretty accurate. Although the nudity etc is pretty tame by today's standards, this would still at least warrant 'a letter home' if teachers wanted to show it in school. It is bawdy and quite indulgent, but as others have commented that is in keeping with both the story and the director. Am now going to seek out the other 2 films and see what they are like....Tom Baker does indeed reveal all, quite a disturbing experience..

Entertaining romp through medieval England
One of Pasolini's trilogy of films exploring the story-telling tradition ("Decameron" and "Arabian Nights" are the other two), and a central storyline which is probably the most familiar of the three for British, if not other, English speaking audiences. Pilgrims assemble at a tavern in Southwark to begin their journey to Canterbury and the martyr's burial place.

Chaucer's central conceit, in writing the "Canterbury Tales", was that here we have a collection of apparently devout individuals, setting out on a pilgrimage, a journey of discovery and faith, yet they find the notion so inherently boring they have to spice it up by telling one another bawdy and decidedly not very spiritually uplifting tales. The moral of the tale is in the moralities of the tellers!

Pasolini turns the tables on poor old Geoffrey Chaucer. In this film, Chaucer is stripped of his artistic integrity and satirical pen, to become a hen-pecked husband who scribbles erotic tales for his own amusement and gratification. But, of course, the director himself plays the part of Chaucer!

And the tales are bawdy. The costumes, settings and action is surreal. A fine actor like Huw Griffiths is reduced to a caricature by the dubbed Italian and the subtitles. Pasolini demands a melodramatic acting style, a throwback to the storytelling times - and there are moments in the film where he pays homage to Chaplin and the Keystone Cops. The bawdy, slapstick nature of comedy is timeless. And silent comedy, mime, is equally a part of a living, storytelling tradition.

Chaucer's characters flow across the screen. The Wife of Bath is insatiable. Tom Baker reveals all, but this was before his Dr.Who days! The action descends into Hell ... a pastiche of Hieronymus Bosch's vision. Pasolini keeps returning to themes of brotherhood, deceit and deception. He explores male bonding and friendship ... and its potential for corruption. Three friends try to outwit one another, but only Death triumphs. Death is no fearful spectre, but a consummate teller of tales, a manipulator of reality.

This is a triumphantly funny and bawdy little romp into English literature, a roller-coaster ride of individual idiosyncrasies and frailties. Exotic, surreal, and outrageous in places, it's an entertaining and engrossing film.

The Ultimate Naughty Film !!!!
I first saw this film at the cinema in the early 70s and hoped one day it would be issued on video; it is priceless and wonderful, very bawdy for its day but not tasteless like much of today's vomit-inspiring trash which is relentlessy churned out. This film is in a class of its own - I only wish that it had not been dubbed into Italian with English subtitles as this somewhat spoils one's concentration - but I love it!!!