From page to screen, the role of literature in the films of Luchino Visconti

grantor: University of TorontoThis dissertation focuses on the role that literature plays in the cinema of Luchino Visconti. The Milanese director based nine of his fourteen feature films on literary works. As such, a study of his cinema provides ample opportunity to analyze the ways in which literature can be used to create cinema. I have developed the hypothesis that there can be different ' modes' of cinematic adaptation. I have termed these modes ' source, influence', and 'blueprint'. I have selected three films from Visconti's filmography to illustrate how each mode can be defined. Chapter 1 examines Visconti's second film, 'La terra trema ' ('The Earth Trembles', 1948). This chapter illustrates how a literary source can give a film a precise artistic, historical, and ideological grounding; at the same time, the source's message can be moulded in order to modernize the meaning of adaptation. I have labelled this use of literature as "source." Chapter 2 examines the 1954 film, ' Senso' ('The Wanton Countess'). This chapter analyzes the way in which Visconti employs specific literary and artistic "influences" to advance his experiment with cinematic neorealism in a unique way. Combining a critical rereading of history and the genre of melodrama, Visconti heads in a new and controversial direction with 'Senso'. Finally, Chapter 3 examines 'Il Gattopardo' ('The Leopard', 1963). This chapter presents a case in which Visconti follows a literary text very closely, to the point that one can speak of that text as a "blueprint." Based on Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's 1958 novel, the film aims to prove that similar effects can be achieved in literature and in film despite the differences between the two media.Ph.D