La Notte 4K 1961 Ultra HD 2160p

A married couple—writer Giovanni and his wife Lydia—visit their good friend Tommaso in the hospital, then spend the night at a party thrown by tycoon Gerardini, who offers Giovanni a job writing a book about the history of his company. In front of each other, the spouses flirt with other people. This night is a vague time of doubts and unanswered questions, and only dawn will put everything in its place in the characters' relationships.

User Review

One of Michelangelo Antonioni's most successful films, La Notte is a dark, slow-paced, black-and-white masterpiece that captivates viewers from the very first frames. Yes, there is very little action, which is unusual, but throughout the entire film, in every episode and every scene, you can feel the sharp mind of the genius director.

La Notte is the story of two elderly spouses. Giovanni is a famous writer and intellectual, although he has not written anything for a long time. As he puts it, he has no new ideas and does not know what to write about or how to write. Over the years of their marriage, Giovanni and Lydia have lost the important link that previously connected them: love. However, they are unaware of this, continuing to live as before, without thinking about the fact that each day distances them further and further from each other. Giovanni looks at women who are more beautiful and younger, while Lydia is content with the fact that their friend Tomazzi is in love with her...
The saddest thing is that no one is to blame; it is time. Everything comes to an end. Sooner or later, the writer falls into a creative crisis, friendship turns into a duty, married life into a routine, love dies. The greatest tragedy of life is not that people die, but that they stop loving.

This is the most beautiful black-and-white film I have ever seen. The soft twilight, the graceful shadow of Monica Vitti standing by the window—what could be more beautiful? The film provides an incomparable aesthetic pleasure; it is a true work of art. La Notte is one of Michelangelo Antonioni's last black-and-white films. Three years later, he would shoot The Red Desert, colored like Battleship Potemkin, also a masterpiece, but in color.

If in reviews of other films it is customary to talk about the wide range of emotions portrayed by the actors, then here it would be fair to mention their absence. From the very first scenes, there is a sense of stiffness in the relationship between the main characters. Their faces express nothing; they wear the masks of intellectual spouses, respected people. Giovanni and Lydia play roles they have invented for themselves, and this oppresses them; they are bored together. Lydia, no longer able to bear the sight of her comfortable, convenient, but also boring home, leaves, going wherever her eyes take her. But even walks in the suburbs of Milan do not interest her much; she is indifferent to everything that is happening. Giovanni, on the other hand, simply finds it difficult to be with Lydia, which is clearly seen in the scene in the nightclub. Of course, Marcello Mastroianni and Jeanne Moreau brilliantly embodied their characters, because it is sometimes more difficult to restrain emotions than to display them.
Michelangelo Antonioni's muse, Monica Vitti, without exaggeration the most beautiful woman in Italian cinema, also starred in this film. Her character, who is also openly bored and lonely, perhaps because of her unusual behavior or unearthly beauty, still seems to be the only breath of fresh air in a world of dusty intellectuals, disappointed spouses, and industrial magnates who think only of profit.

The night in this film should be understood not only literally, as the time of day when the main events took place, but also as a metaphor for spiritual gloom and confusion, death and the collapse of hopes. The finale, which represents an awakening after a long night, when Lydia reads Giovanni's letter, may be one of the most powerful scenes in cinema for you; at this moment, reality is seen particularly clearly and truthfully. Alas, of all the eternal things, love is the shortest.

La Notte is a chronicle of the demise of feelings and emotions, a story of inexplicable emotional impulses, a drama of gradually disintegrating family relationships, a heavy existential masterpiece that is simply a must-see.

Info Video

Codec: HEVC / H.265 (92.5 Mb/s)
Resolution: Native 4K (2160p)
HDR: Dolby Vision, HDR10
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1

Info Audio

#Italian: FLAC 1.0
#English: Dolby Digital 2.0 (Commentary by Tony Rayns)

Info Subtitles