Senso ontologico, mimesis e rappresentazione: la sceneggiatura d’autore come testo letterario. Proposte di analisi di alcuni scenari di Pier Paolo Pasolini e Cesare Zavattini

Abstract

Is it possible to consider a cinematographic screenplay as a literary work and not more just like a «transient state» (as Giorgio Tinazzi says in his studies on Cinema and Literature) or a text which can only be read as a technical note strictly connected to the filmic realization? And what kind of critical and interpretative approaches could we adopt to study a scenario such as a literary text? So the main purpose of this thesis is to study a screenplay realized by a literary author as a literary text (a novel, for example) and not only like a script containing only directions on the locations and gestures for the movie. This includes a linguistic approach to the texts, in order to find the techniques for speech reproduction, and also an interpretative approach to find the main characteristics of the style and of the Weltanschauung of the writer. The linguistic approach aims at investigating the screenplay as a text belonging to the linguistic category of the “scritto-trasmesso” (written-speech), typical of the so-called “diamesia” – (derived from the Greek words dia, διά ‘through’and mesos, έσος ‘middle’), while the interpretative one wants to study the cultural identity of the two writers and also to search, in their own style, the way they use to represent and reproduce reality. The thesis deals with screenplays written by Pier Paolo Pasolini and Cesare Zavattini. Regarding Pasolini, it seemed very important to focus the attention on two fundamental aspects: the free expression of the triumph of the senses and bodily impulses and the harsh poverty that pervades the representation of roman underclass of 60s. So the two screenplays analyzer are : Il Decameron and Accattone. While the two chosen scenarios by Zavattini, Miracolo a Milano and Umberto D., represent the neo-realist orthodoxy and the need for an instance of mimesis and also the fantasy and the magic realism that represent the style of the auctor.