So what's it about? Ahh, it's about how the world after WW2 is going to be without love. No. It's about the woman being treated unfairly in the west and the east. No. It's about the human being who can't find love yet; namely the desperate moment of living lonely whether with a dying educated who became sexually inadequate, or a healthy uncivilized who is sexually obsessed! At any rate, IT'S UNBEARABLE FILM. So it doesn't have the slightest ability to make me interest in whatever it says!
I didn't find anything interesting at all. I hated to see (Debra Winger), one of her generation's best actresses and beauties, in a wasted time like this. The sufferance of her character was incredibly overmatched by ours during the watching. The pace is dead with nothing going on, and long shots for the dark deserts. (Bernardo Bertolucci) fell in such a ridiculous love with the Arabian nights, shooting the moon from maybe 90 angles. These shots, great basis for tourist calendar, are really the only thing here to call perfect! I think he originally wanted to make a movie about the east's magic and vagueness, his east's magic and vagueness, however with the totally wrong material.
I don't need to say that this is the meanest place to meet Arabian characters. They're all: pimps, thieves, prostitutes, sex maniacs, mad women; it tells you a lot about who were the persons that the author went to meet in his trips for the east, if there was any!
On the other hand, the western characters are badly portrayed too. The old lady, her pathetically gay son,.. etc. But anyway, if this film wanted to show an ugly world then it did, but for what purpose?!! If it was about the search for satisfaction as endless, then it's where I was eventually unsatisfied indeed. There is something to be said, however it's shatteringly said. By the way, it has no end. I mean it's not good or bad, it's not even there. And yeah, the appearance of (Paul Bowles), the author of the book which this movie was based on, at the end is one of the most embarrassing moments in the history of cinema; I believe the film didn't demand to be more surreal!
Some might see that (Bertolucci) is a genius. After watching some of his works, I don't. In fact, he's far from being one. There is lust and loss in his films, but mostly a lust for the loss of any good meaning or art along the way too!
In general, a good story it isn't. A soft porn it strongly aspires after. An arty film about alienation it could be, yet so heavily done. Now, let me depose my objective alter ego to declare it frankly; whether it's (The Sheltering Sky), (Tea in the Desert), or even (The Sheltering Tea), it ended up as boring and worst of all pointless. It's not "I hate this film", rather "this is a film to hate"!
PS: While the film takes place in 1947, we hear in the background of some Algerian street the Arabian song "Han El Wid" or "Love Became Underestimated", by the great Egyptian composer / singer (Mohamed Abd El-Wahab), which was released in 1963!
I didn't find anything interesting at all. I hated to see (Debra Winger), one of her generation's best actresses and beauties, in a wasted time like this. The sufferance of her character was incredibly overmatched by ours during the watching. The pace is dead with nothing going on, and long shots for the dark deserts. (Bernardo Bertolucci) fell in such a ridiculous love with the Arabian nights, shooting the moon from maybe 90 angles. These shots, great basis for tourist calendar, are really the only thing here to call perfect! I think he originally wanted to make a movie about the east's magic and vagueness, his east's magic and vagueness, however with the totally wrong material.
I don't need to say that this is the meanest place to meet Arabian characters. They're all: pimps, thieves, prostitutes, sex maniacs, mad women; it tells you a lot about who were the persons that the author went to meet in his trips for the east, if there was any!
On the other hand, the western characters are badly portrayed too. The old lady, her pathetically gay son,.. etc. But anyway, if this film wanted to show an ugly world then it did, but for what purpose?!! If it was about the search for satisfaction as endless, then it's where I was eventually unsatisfied indeed. There is something to be said, however it's shatteringly said. By the way, it has no end. I mean it's not good or bad, it's not even there. And yeah, the appearance of (Paul Bowles), the author of the book which this movie was based on, at the end is one of the most embarrassing moments in the history of cinema; I believe the film didn't demand to be more surreal!
Some might see that (Bertolucci) is a genius. After watching some of his works, I don't. In fact, he's far from being one. There is lust and loss in his films, but mostly a lust for the loss of any good meaning or art along the way too!
In general, a good story it isn't. A soft porn it strongly aspires after. An arty film about alienation it could be, yet so heavily done. Now, let me depose my objective alter ego to declare it frankly; whether it's (The Sheltering Sky), (Tea in the Desert), or even (The Sheltering Tea), it ended up as boring and worst of all pointless. It's not "I hate this film", rather "this is a film to hate"!
PS: While the film takes place in 1947, we hear in the background of some Algerian street the Arabian song "Han El Wid" or "Love Became Underestimated", by the great Egyptian composer / singer (Mohamed Abd El-Wahab), which was released in 1963!