Conversation Piece [Gruppo di Famiglia in un Interno] **** (1974, Burt Lancaster, Helmut Berger, Silvana Mangano) – Classic Movie Review 3190

Luchino Visconti’s 1974 penultimate film Conversation Piece is a stately, elegant and affecting fable, reuniting him with his longtime companion Helmut Berger and Burt Lancaster. 

Co-writer/director Luchino Visconti’s penultimate conversation piece movie from 1974 is a stately, elegant and chilly but affecting fable, reuniting him with Burt Lancaster, Visconti’s star in The Leopard.

Lancaster gives a superb performance as Il Professore, an ageing American professor who is confronted by the vulgar, obnoxious aristocratic marchesa Bianca Brumonti (Silvana Mangano) and reluctantly lets a floor in his Roman luxurious palazzo to some youthful people – the Marchesa’s young German lover Konrad Huebel (Helmut Berger), her daughter Lietta and her daughter’s boyfriend.

This forces Il Professore to face the modern world, his homosexual feelings and his fear of mortality, as he recalls the old days of his life with his mother (Dominique Sanda in an uncredited cameo) and with his wife (Claudia Cardinale in an uncredited very brief role). Cardinale was another star in The Leopard.

Visconti wanted his The Damned and Death in Venice star Dirk Bogarde for the central role, which seems to be clearly based on the director himself, but Bogarde turned him down, and an ideal Lancaster brings his own special qualities of lofty dignity and noble calm.

However, the central character was apparently actually based on the Italian art critic and scholar Mario Praz, and title recalls Praz’s book Conversation Pieces: A Survey of the Informal Group Portrait in Europe and America.

This silver-spoon film’s claustrophobia is sometimes stifling – deliberately so – but its high quality is undeniable and its unfolding of emotional truths is both affecting and revealing. The screenplay by Visconti, Suso Cecchi D’Amico and Enrico Medioli is based on Medioli’s original story, which has been seen as an allegory of the relationship between Berger and Visconti. The title refers to an informal group portrait.

Stefano Patrizi plays Stefano, Ervira Cortese plays Erminia, Claudia Marsani is Lietta Brumonti and Romolo Valli is Micheli.

Conversation Piece [Gruppo di Famiglia in un Interno] runs 121 minutes, is made by Rusconi Film and Gaumont, and is distributed by Cinema International Corporation (Italy) and Gaumont (France). The cinematographer is Pasqualino De Santis, the producer is Giovanni Bertolucci, the score is by Franco Mannino, and the production designer is Mario Garbuglia.

It was filmed simultaneously both in English and Italian. In the Italian version, Lancaster’s and Berger’s lines are dubbed into Italian by other actors.

Berger named this several times as his favourite of his films.

It was released on 10 December 1974 (Milan premiere), 20 December 1974 (Italy) and 19 March 1975 (France).

The cast are Burt Lancaster as Il Professore [The Professor]. Helmut Berger as Konrad Hübel, Silvana Mangano as Marchesa Bianca Brumonti, Claudia Marsani as Lietta Brumonti, Stefano Patrizi as Lietta’s fiancé Stefano, Romolo Valli as Professor’s lawyer Micheli, Elvira Cortese as Professor’s housekeeper Erminia, Philippe Hersent as the porter Domenico, Guy Tréjan as first art dealer, Jean-Pierre Zola as second art dealer Blanchard, Umberto Raho as first Police inspector, Enzo Fiermonte as second Police inspector, Dominique Sanda as the Professor’s mother, and Claudia Cardinale as the Professor’s wife.

Helmut Berger in 1974.

Visconti was the longtime companion of Helmut Berger from 1964 until his death. Visconti suffered his first stroke while they were filming Ludwig (1972) and died of another stroke on March 17 1976, aged 69. His final film is L’innocente (1976).

Visconti’s death plunged Berger into a personal crisis. A year afterwards he tried to commit suicide, and later drug and alcohol abuse troubled his acting career.

Austrian actor Helmut Berger [Steinberger] died on 18 May 2023, at the age of 78.

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Helmut Berger and Burt Lancaster in Conversation Piece [Gruppo di Famiglia in un Interno] (1974).

Silvana Mangano and Helmut Berger in Conversation Piece [Gruppo di Famiglia in un Interno] (1974).