Malena

Malena is interesting to me because it's an example of how perspective and framing can elevate a film. The story is fundamentally about Malena, but it's never shown or written from her perspective. The lead character being a young boy who constantly fantasizes about her is an engaging hook because he is sympathetic towards her but he values her primarily as an object for his own sexual interests rather than as a human with their own autonomy. What makes this more engaging is that the boy has more of an innocent lust for her, one we can safely assume won't be reciprocated by Malena herself, whereas the grown men in Malena's life have a similarly possessive view of her that's far more malicious.

I think this contrast is much of the foundation of the movie's storytelling. It gets sort of repetitive in how it plays into this, but I do think the moment to moment does at least play into different idealisms of machoism and shows a sense of reflection of how the malicious elements of that eventually contaminate the innocent. Renato's fantasies often involve himself being some dominant force in the relationship, wherein Malena serves him as a reward for some masculine act of "bravery" that's very much informed by the fascist milieu of Italy in the 40s. One that views men as needing to be superficially heroic through acts of violence and power rather than through empathy or good character. Renato believes himself to be entitled to Malena's affection because of how he views himself and the ideal he wants to be rather than what is actually real, and a lot of his development comes in the self-actualization of realizing how fabricated those fantasies are. It's why late in the movie, when he starts realizing the trauma Malena experiences, his fantasies stop being part of the narrative.

But I do think that when Renato does this, I don't think he ever stops his possessive feelings toward her. His fantasies, while deeply objectifying her, never show her actually being harmed or abused in the ways he sees in reality. His fantasy is one in which Malena is willingly subservient to Renato's desires, not one in which he physically or mentally dominates her in the cruel way the men in Malena's life actually do. In this sense, it paves the way for Renato to be more sympathetic to her than the men in her life, but not necessarily have that drastically different a view of her in terms of objectification. Renato never really considers what her desires or ideals are. He never stops viewing her as an object of desire, in spite of being better intentioned, that she is the ideal he always desired. The ending scene where he expresses, "I have loved many women. And as they've held me close... and asked if I will remember them I've said, 'Yes, I will remember you.' But the only one I've never forgotten is the one who never asked... Malena." To me suggests that Malena was memorable to him more on his ideal of her than from a personal relation to her. He never truly got to know her personally or know her beyond the image of her.

This may be a bit uncharitable of a reading of Renato's character since he does actively do good deeds for her. But my point isn't to suggest Renato is a vile person as much as it is that his view of others is shallow. He has a shallow view of Malena and, through his shallow perception, becomes sympathetic. An object; after all, can be a source of sympathy. And for Renato, Malena is a tarnished ideal that society simply did not appreciate as much as he does. He never loved her as a person; rather, he loved her as a symbol of his childhood fantasy. But this isn't far off from the common lived experience. There are plenty of people we get exposed to in life whom we sympathize with based on limited information. Sometimes, they can impact us in ways personal relations don't because they inform us of what we hold as a standard. There's something to be said about how toxic para-social relations form out of this, but this movie isn't concerned with that topic as much as it is the way our fantasy shapes our perception of others.

Renata objectifies Malena, but he still sees the events around her as morally wrong and tragic. I think it's fair to see this movie as a self-reflection of male fetishism and how it leads to dehumanization, but I think there's an underrated element here to how despite that dehumanization Renato still grants her some semblance of moral dignity. Not one that's ideal, but certainly one that views the wrongs towards her as a crime. Renato, unlike other characters in the film, learned to grow from his fantasies and at least find the moral good in those he objectifies. And I think this is the strong point of the film: it challenges us on sexual fantasy but does not wallow in the implication that it can't be salvaged or necessarily leads to the worst outcome.

There's something to be said about this movie's hyperbole and the unbelievable extremes that exist sometimes when depicting Malena's trauma, but I can suspend my disbelief for it on the conceit it is expressing. I think most of it is done with intent. Malena's characterization is limited to accentuate Renato's fantasy, which he develops from limited information. Yet we still see how so much of Renato's fantasy clashes with her reality. Renato's parents punish him for his perverted fantasies, but this only turns Malena into a sacred desire for him. Renato actually experiencing sex at the whore house demystifies Malena but never truly swerves him away from the objectification of her. There are a lot of things here that twist and turn Renato's idolization of Malena in interesting ways.

Of course, it's not limited to Renato's insight. There's a lot to dig into about the societal expectations of someone like Malena that come from both men and women that lean on ideas of accountability and perception. These mesh well with Renato's fantasies because they defy his idealism, but I think they're also interesting on their own because the movie is defining this from the perspective of everyone but Malena. You're understanding her trauma as a distant bystander, and that's what allows her to be so compelling and tragic.

The people who treat this film as simply a justification for the male gaze astound me. This is a movie that is challenging that perception, asking us the consequences of our social attitudes towards specific kinds of people and suggesting that an inhumane fantasy does not need to lead to depravity. This is why I think this movie deserves a lot more merit than it is given.