Athens International Film Festival

The Spider's Stratagem

In this brilliant piece of filmmaking, that forms an imaginary diptych with ?The Conformist?, Bertolucci ponders the existential crisis of the young upper-middle class crowd in the crossroads of History, in one of the most significant but lesser known movies in his filmography.

Bernardo Bertolucci is clearly inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’ short story "Theme of the Traitor and the Hero", transporting the action to a small town in the Italian North at two different times, in 1936 and in 1969. A young man arrives on the spot where his father was murdered by a fascist, while he was plotting to assassinate Mussolini.

The locals have erected a statue to commemorate his bravery, but the son (father and son are both played by the same actor, Giulio Brogi) is determined to discover his father’s unknown murderers in order to find out exactly what happened. Which he does, although he’ll never be able to reveal the truth.

In this brilliant piece of filmmaking, that forms an imaginary diptych with “The Conformist”, Bertolucci ponders the existential crisis of the young upper-middle class crowd in the crossroads of History, in one of the most significant but lesser known movies in his filmography. Y.B.