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Pasolini's Oedipus Rex revisited
The opening sequences lack narrative contextualization to connect them either to an
individual's dream or memory, or to define them as orthodox flashbacks. This adds a degree
of uncertainty to their function in the film, unless we consider them as a kind of prologue
following the conventions of Greek tragedy, according to which the first scene or monologue
illustrates the action(s) preceding the portrayed events. The fragmented quality of the scenes
between Caterina and young Joe, together with analogies in the mise-en-scene, evoke
Pasolini's staging of the prologue of his Edipo Re/Oedipus Rex (1967), which used a format
referencing the conventions of Greek tragedy. In Edipo Re the prologue is also fragmented
and spread over unconnected sequences. First Pasolini shows the enchanting discovery made
by baby Oedipus - as he is breastfed - and by the viewers, of Giocasta's beauty, the actress
Silvana Mangano's face being shown in close up in a long duration shot. Mother and son are
sitting in an idyllic country landscape, filmed on a gloriously sunny day like the seascape
sequence in La luna.
A few shots later Oedipus is portrayed as a toddler who frightened by deafening
fireworks cries inconsolably as his parents dance happily, oblivious to him. Curiously, the
role of Merope, the queen who acts as Oedipus's adoptive mother, was played by Alida Valli
who plays the role of Joe's grandmother in La luna. Whether or not this is a coincidence, the
parallel between the films explains the nature and function of the sequences between Caterina
and Joe within the narrative scheme of La luna, since Caterina s obliviousness to the child's
distress, and more importantly to the dangerous twine in which he gets caught, functions as a
prologue to anticipate the hazards which ensnare Joe in his adolescence. The analogies
between La luna and Edipo Re end here, as Pasolini adhered to the original unfolding of the
tragedy with Oedipus unaware of Giocasta's identity, and because his casting of Franco Citti
- an adult - in the role of Oedipus rendered plausible the powerful reciprocal love between
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