Pier Paolo Pasolini's "Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma" ("Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom" in English) turned out to be his final movie, and got released a few weeks after his murder. Since he was known for movies that riled the authorities, this was a natural choice for him. While the main thing that one notices is the shock value, Pasolini noted that he intended the movie as a look at the relation between power and its subjects. Indeed, for what reason did Mussolini turn Italy into a police state but to let the ruling class be able to do whatever they wanted? To be certain, the middle-aged prostitutes who tell the young men stories to sexually arouse them are the equivalent of bread and circuses.

Basically, it's a story of humanity's base impulses taken to their horrific extremes. It's easy to view this as one of the most disgusting movies ever filmed, but Pasolini made it to indict fascism and Italy's ruling class in general. I recommend it, but only watch it if you have a strong stomach.

In 1944/1945, in Italy, Fascists capture some locals and submit them to tortures and humiliations. Yesterday I watched this sick film on cable TV for the first time, since it has not been released on VHS or DVD in Brazil. Sorry, guys, but I really disagree with the opinion of many IMDB users: I did not find any art, culture or entertainment in this film. I found it worthwhile to watch it once, just to know this Pasolini's flick, but in my opinion it is a crap. It is very similar to Tinto Brass porno-chic `Caligola', which at least has a great cast. The intention of shocking with Saló is achieved, but I do not need to see a girl eating s**t to be aware of the horrors of the fascists in Italy in Mussolini's period. Let me leave a question for those who like this film and say that it is a masterpiece: `- Would you invite your mother, your son or your daughter to watch this movie with you after dinner?' My vote is four.

Title (Brazil): `Saló ou Os 120 Dias de Sodoma' (`Saló or The 120 Days of Sodom)

This is probably a film that needed to be made that deservedly brought out a lot of anger in society. It is a film that exposes the hypocrisy of so much in society and reveals the evil that lingers in even the cleanest of souls. The bourgeoisie with definite fascist leanings take it upon themselves to rape the souls of the Innocent and beautiful, exposing their own ugliness under the structure of class. The more beautiful the innocent, the more desirable for the destruction from the minds of these evil wealthy aristocrats. The easiest way out is death as evidenced by one of the captured young men who would prefer that then what he feels lies ahead.

Pasolini looked for only the most beautiful of young men and the most innocent of the young women, showing a torture of the unknown when they are brought to a castle where they become the sexual slaves of these depraved adults. You can get distracted by the nudity of the young men and women, and certainly, there is an erotic feel to it, at first. But the more it goes on, the crueler it gets, and the more you long for these innocent young people to find peace through death or for the disgusting older people to get comeuppance.

The visuals after a while become very disturbing, one particular moment involving razors in food given to a young woman while she is forced to act like a dog truly heart wrenching. The stories involving homosexual encounters makes it clear that they are not damning same sex love or lust but the degrading way they are forced on the mostly unwilling victims. The women captors are even more vile in some way than the male captors because their faces express a hatred over anything beautiful because their own beauty, if it ever existed, has morphed into something truly graphically hideous, accented by garish makeup and a glee over the tortures.

A scene of one of the young men looking on lovingly one of the captors strikes fear because it's obvious that the goal of destroying a soul has been achieved, simply because the victim will grow up to be as depraved as the man who abuses him. Who would I recommend this to then? Film students of course and political science majors and students of world history, artists who can see the evil hidden among the beauty, and those who have the strength to see the moral flaws that exist in everybody that we discipline ourselves to avoid acting on.

There seem to be prints of this of varying lengths, as well as an English dubbed print, but I wouldn't seek the longer print of the one I saw (exactly two hours) as once is enough. I am glad that I found a patient moment in my schedule to endure this, but I certainly wouldn't put myself through this again.