La Commare Secca (The Grim Reaper). 1962. Italy. Directed by Bernardo Bertolucci. Written by Bernardo Bertolucci, Sergio Citti, Pier Paolo Pasolini. 35mm. In Italian with English subtitles. 88 min.
The Brazilian-born Fabiano Canosa made his mark as a film programmer in the early 1970s at the First Avenue Screening Room, receiving a NY Film Critics Award in 1975 for his innovative work there. A few years later Public Theater director Joseph Papp hired Canosa to create a film program in the Public’s 90-seat Little Theater (which had been the home of the Anthology Film Archives from 1970 to 1974). Among the theater’s announced goals, when it reopened in 1978, was to show films “that never found the proper outlet to the public at all.” Bernardo Bertolucci’s startling 1962 debut The Grim Reaper, a mystery/drama about the murder of a prostitute near the TIber river, with a screenplay by Pier Paolo Pasolini, is a perfect example. In 1983 Canosa gave the film a three-week run at the Public Theater. Vincent Canby of the New York Times recommended the film, praising its “disciplined flamboyance.”