VV. (10) - Summary & Thoughts Pt. 2

[David Morris]

http://www.weeklywire.com/filmvault/austin/s/stendahlsyndromet1.html

"The Stendahl Syndrome
DIRECTED BY: Dario Argento
In the mid-19th century while on a tour of Italian architecture, the famed 
French author Stendahl found himself so overwhelmed by the beauty of what he 
was seeing that he slipped into a mysterious fugue state from which it took 
him days to recover. That's the titular syndrome of Argento's recent (it was 
shot in 1996) film, though, as fans of the Italian horror director may have 
guessed, it's little more than a suitably arcane jumping-off point for 
another of the filmmaker's bizarre examinations of madness, obsession, and 
bloodshed. Argento's daughter, Asia, plays Roman detective Anna Manni, who, 
as the film opens, finds herself inexorably drawn to a painting in the 
Uffizi gallery in Florence. Swooning, she collapses to the floor and dreams 
of actually entering the oceanic painting to swim (and caress) the fish 
within."

>From: "John Bailey" Mantissa, however, is suddenly struck by the colours of 
>the painting and , in a rare instance of Stendahl's Syndrome, sees the 
>colours shifting, drawing him back into a part of his mind which had until 
>now been fairly safely contained behind his sad and weary eyes (see the 
>first description of him on p.159 for the first reference to blond 
>seamstress and his suppression of her). His feelings here, previously 
>sublimated into a perverse desire for Botticelli's painting, are released 
>and he is struck with the realisation that his desire is, you got it, that 
>"dream of annihilation". Lacan would be useful here.
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