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Watch Film$3
Sebastiane
United Kingdom
1976
82 Min
Color
1.37:1
Latin
Subtitled in English
Audio in Latin
Currently 3.5/5 Stars.
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DIR Derek Jarman, Paul Humfress
PROD Howard Malin, James Whaley
SCR Derek Jarman, Paul Humfress, James Whaley
DP Peter Middleton
CAST Leonardo Treviglio, Barney James, Neil Kennedy, Richard Warwick, Donald Dunham, Daevid Finbar, Ken Hicks, Lindsay Kemp, Steffano Massari, Janusz Romanov, Robert Medley, Jordan, Peter Hinwood, Gerald Incandela, Nell Campbell, Patricia Quinn
ED Paul Humfress
MUSIC Brian Eno
SOUND John Hayes
Outfest (Special Events)
Synopsis
Director Derek Jarman¡¯s (Caravaggio, The Tempest) feature film debut Sebastiane lays bare the latent homoeroticism that has always lurked beneath the glossy surface of Hollywood biblical epics. Jarman crafts his slyly lurid yet exquisitely poetic historical drama around the martyrdom of St. Sebastian in the same way that Italian Renaissance painters used the image of St. Sebastian to eroticize the male nude. Though audaciously performed entirely in Latin, and carrying the same visual boldness of Jarman¡¯s collaboration with Ken Russell on The Devils, Sebastiane depicts both earthly lust and spiritual yearning with what The Guardian described as ¡°an honesty and directness that¡¯s the absolute opposite of camp.¡± _Sebastiane_¡¯s lyricism is supported by one of cult composer Brian Eno¡¯s first and best music scores.
Stripped of rank and exiled to a remote Sardinian outpost, Roman soldier and suspected Christian Sebastian (Leonardo Treviglio) becomes the object of his commanding officer Severus¡¯ (Barney James) aggressive desire. As Sebastian turns his back on his fellow soldiers in favor of his own visionary mystical longings, the sun-bleached Mediterranean idyll becomes a psycho-sexual hothouse where predatory desire and religious longing set the stage for a shocking tableau of death and martyrdom.
Sebastiane caused a riot when it premiered at the Locarno Film Festival, and was a surprise hit upon its initial release in the UK. ¡ªKino
Director
Derek Jarman
Derek Jarman (January 31, 1942- February 19, 1994), British film director, artist, and writer.
Jarman¡¯s first films were experimental super 8mm shorts, a form he never entirely abandoned, and later developed further (in his films Imagining October (1984), The Angelic Conversation (1985), The Last Of England (1987) and The Garden (1990)) as a parallel to his narrative work.
Jarman made his debut in ¡°overground¡± narrative filmmaking with the groundbreaking Sebastiane (1976), arguably the first British film to feature positive images of gay sexuality, and the first (and to date, only) film entirely in Latin. He follwed this with the film many regard as his first masterpiece, Jubilee (shot 1977, released 1978), in which Queen Elizabeth I of England is transported forward in time to a desolate and brutal wasteland ruled by her twentieth century namesake. Jubilee was arguably the first UK punk movie, and amongst its cast featured punk groups and figures such as Wayne County¡­ read more
Derek Jarman (January 31, 1942- February 19, 1994), British film director, artist, and writer.
Jarman¡¯s first films were experimental super 8mm shorts, a form he never entirely abandoned, and later developed further (in his films Imagining October (1984), The Angelic Conversation (1985), The Last Of England (1987) and The Garden (1990)) as a parallel to his narrative work.
Jarman made his debut in ¡°overground¡± narrative filmmaking with the groundbreaking Sebastiane (1976), arguably the first British film to feature positive images of gay sexuality, and the first (and to date, only) film entirely in Latin. He follwed this with the film many regard as his first masterpiece, Jubilee (shot 1977, released 1978), in which Queen Elizabeth I of England is transported forward in time to a desolate and brutal wasteland ruled by her twentieth century namesake. Jubilee was arguably the first UK punk movie, and amongst its cast featured punk groups and figures such as Wayne County, Jordan and Adam and the Ants.
Jarman was a forthright and prominent gay activist.
After making the unconventional Shakespeare adaptation The Tempest in 1979 (a film praised by several Shakespeare scholars, but dismissed by some traditionalist critics), Jarman spent seven years making experimental super 8mm films and attempting to raise money for Caravaggio (he later claimed to have rewritten the script seventeen times during this period). Finally released in 1986, it attracted a comparitively wide audience (and is still, barring the cult hit Jubilee, probably his most widely-known work), partly due to the involvement, for the first time, of the British television company Channel 4 in funding and distribution. This marked the beginning of a new phase in Jarman¡¯s filmmaking career: from now on all his films would be part-funded by television companies, often receiving their most prominent exhibition in TV screenings.
The conclusion of Caravaggio also marked the beginning of a temporary abandonment of traditional narrative in Jarman¡¯s work. Frustrated by the formality of 35mm film production, and the institutional dependence and resultant prolonged inactivity associated with it (which had already cost him seven years with Caravaggio, as well as derailing several long-term projects), Jarman returned to and expanded the super 8mm-based form he had previously worked in on Imagining October and The Angelic Conversation.
The first film to result from this new semi-narrative phase, The Last of England tolled the death of a country, ravaged by Thatcher¡¯s conservatism. ¡°Wrenchingly beautiful¡­the film is one of the few commanding works of personal cinema in the late 80¡¯s¡ªa call to open our eyes to a world violated by greed and repression, to see what irrevocable damage has been wrought on city, countryside and soul, how our skies, our bodies, have turned poisonous,¡± The Village Voice
During the making of The Garden, Jarman became seriously ill. Although he recovered sufficiently to complete the film, he never attempted anything on a comparable scale afterwards, returning to a more pared-down form for his concluding narrative films, Edward II (perhaps his most politically outspoken work, informed by his Queer activism) and the Brechtian biographical study Wittgenstein, a delicate tragicomedy.
The film Blue was his last testament as a film-maker. At the time when he made the film, he was blind and dying of AIDS related complications. Blue consists of a single shot of saturated blue colour filling the screen, as background to a soundtrack composed by Simon Fisher Turner featuring original music by Coil (band) and other artists, where Jarman describes his life and vision. ¡ªBiographybase.com
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barbudean
7Aug11
what a piece of art.
Arcanus
2Jun11
Totally camp and kinky! Gayer than a ninety five pence note!
Wortzik
10Mar11
Absolutelly fascinating. Might not have been historically accurate but who cares anyway? It is great cinema and it has so much to show.
mintghost
19Nov10
love it.
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Articles
Our roundup of essays and articles on this film.
The Forgotten: Lost Patrol
By David Cairns on May 14, 2009
New York's Museum of Modern Art continues its Julien Duvivier retrospective all through May, bringing to light dozens of dazzling films from read article
Lists
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Martyrdom on Holiday
By richmon dhill on August 30, 2009
An oddity. Part cinematic affirmation of homosexuality (nothing so unavoidably gay in the semi-mainstream cinema to that point), part sword n¡¯ sandals romp (almost tempted to call it a nudie picture in¡­
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