Teorema (1968)

Teorema (Theorem) is one of those quintessentially exasperating foreign-language art films: Italian with English subtitles, Marxist-toned introductory scene, frequent monochromatic pan shots of a barren mountain range, abrupt scene changes, inexplicable comings and goings, lots of wordless scenes and casual sex (implied, never shown -- this is 1968 after all), odd vignettes, an obnoxious octave-jumping musical score (by Morricone, no less), obtuse symbology that few will understand, and fading to black with "Fine (The End)"! Teorema's message requires some thought but doesn't make it easy. The film's final scene completes a circle with the opening scene (which linearly should be the last), where a TV journalist is interviewing a factory's employees about the significance of its owner turning over ownership of the facility to the workers. He seems to want it both ways, editorializing through loaded questions that employees as owners have lost their right to stage a workers' revolution even as their economic ascension validates the middle class and increasingly identifies it with "humanity," thereby marginalizing the rich and powerful. Next, our story begins as the emotionally barren family of the industrialist in question hosts a houseguest (Terence Stamp) in their manse (for reasons that are never clear). In short order (and usually after a wide crotch shot or a closeup of his blue eyes), every member of the household invites and then welcomes his seduction -- maid, son, mother, daughter, and father. Suddenly, he announces he must leave -- so each family member tearfully relates to him (around the dinner table, no less) how much his "love" has changed them from who they were to what they've become. The rest of the movie shows how they deal with that transformation after his departure -- not well, as a rule. (In the most sane example, the socialite mother takes to picking up multiple young men in front of another city's church for trysts in the dirt outside another church in the countryside.) Each family member in their own way goes insane. The maid, however, apparently attains an odd spiritual transformation through fasting and penitence. You'll have to see Teorema to decide for yourself what it means, but to do so you will need to have made your peace with subtitles as well as symbolic and metaphorical meanings. Don't see Teorema unless you are ready to think it through -- probably after more than one viewing and over several days! I would have rated Teorema 3 stars if the film weren't so exasperating and the actors were better than deadpan. 2.5 stars.