The Skin

This article is about the 1981 Italian film. For other uses, see Skin (disambiguation).

The Skin
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Liliana Cavani
Written by	Robert Katz Liliana Cavani Catherine Breillat
Based on	The Skin by Curzio Malaparte
Produced by	Manolo Bolognini Renzo Rossellini
Starring	Marcello Mastroianni Burt Lancaster
Cinematography	Armando Nannuzzi
Edited by	Ruggero Mastroianni
Distributed by	Cinefrance (Germany) Gaumont Italia (Italy)
Release date	27 August 1981 (1981-08-27)
Running time	131 minutes
Country	Italy
Languages	Italian English

The Skin (Italian: La pelle) is a 1981 Italian war film directed by Liliana Cavani and starring Marcello Mastroianni, Burt Lancaster, Ken Marshall, Carlo Giuffrè and Claudia Cardinale from Curzio Malaparte's book The Skin. It was entered into the 1981 Cannes Film Festival.

Plot

Naples, 1944. General Mark Clark, commander of the United States Fifth Army, is negotiating with Eduardo Marzullo, a Camorra mobster, the delivery of 112 German soldiers captured during the four days of insurrection. Marzullo demands from the Americans a bribe of one hundred lire per kilo, susceptible to strong increases if not quickly paid, for each prisoner. The intermediary is the Italian liaison captain Curzio Malaparte who is also given the task of pleasing the aviator wife of an American senator, and of organizing a Renaissance style dinner that has as its highlight a fish: a "siren" of the Naples aquarium which looks like a cooked child.

Meanwhile in the slums, mothers sell their children as prostitutes to the Moroccan soldiers, and Jim, the young American liaison captain friend of Malaparte, falls in love with a young girl. He discovers she is being exposed by her father for a fee as the only virgin existing in the city. Malaparte moves in this "hell on earth" scenario with detachment. He tries to explain to the woman, during an orgy of homosexuals, that it is the corrupting power of the Americans which has so reduced the moral qualms of the starving people of the city, who are now severely impoverished by the war.

Vesuvius suddenly breaks out in an eruption, during which the aviator undergoes a cruel rape experience from a group of drunken and upset soldiers, an experience that brings her to the same level of all the other innocent and defeated women around her.

The story ends with the arrival of the Fifth Army in Rome through the Appian Way. Among the crowd that welcomes the Americans, and amidst the enthusiasm of the liberation, a poor man ends up crushed under a military tank.

Cast

• Marcello Mastroianni - Curzio Malaparte
• Burt Lancaster - Gen. Mark Clark
• Claudia Cardinale - Princess Consuelo Caracciolo
• Ken Marshall - Jimmy Wren
• Alexandra King - Deborah Wyatt
• Carlo Giuffrè - Eduardo Mazzullo
• Yann Babilée - Jean-Louis
• Jeanne Valérie - Princess in Capri
• Liliana Tari - Maria Concetta
• Peppe Barra - Taylorman (as Giuseppe Barra)
• Cristina Donadio - Friend of Anna
• Rosaria Della Femmina - Jimmy's lover (as Maria Rosaria Della Femmina)
• Jacques Sernas - Gen. Guillaume
• Gianni Abbate
• Anna Maria Ackermann
• Richard E. Carr - PVT Kaminski

External links

• The Skin at IMDb
• The Skin at Rotten Tomatoes
• Filmografia di Liliana Cavani Detailed information on the film and its director.