Really, now, I have to say this so-called review by Chris
Hicks is so typical of the unintelligent banter that turns
a blind eye to the brilliant movies out there. And there
are many of them, including Bertolucci's. THE SHELTERING
SKY is one of his best. Chris Hicks and Leonard Malton
should have gotten a life and have been engineers instead.
The two to not have real respect for filmmakers who think
(and what is wrong with painting interesting and beatiful
and disturbing pictures as he Bertolucci does? Plus it
does too have a narrative! I do agree with the "idle rich"
comment but that's up to us to start buying books and going
to movies that are produced by and are about more real
people. But in the context they were real. And The
Malkovich character made his living off composing, the
woman character off writing. It gives us a stupendous view
of dying and sex and old age. Not to mention how desperate
we become as to actually enjoy be pretty much force into
marriage as the female character is to the man in the
caravan.

People should also check out LITTLE BUDDHA.

My only reservation about Bertolucci, whom I consider one
of the best, along with Hitchcock, von Trier, Polanski,
Oliver Stone etc. is that he pushes buttons to move us, and
maybe it's a male thing, but I don't like my buttons being
pushed, and I prefer a more straightforward (ie. Hitchcock
or von Trier) approach to moving me.

THE SHELTERING SKY is, truly, one of my favourite films.

I am teaching a course on Bertolucci this quarter and I
just showed *Sheltering Sky.* While surfing the net, I
came across Chris Hicks's review and particularly the
following assessment: "The Sheltering Sky" is the kind
of "art" film that discriminating audiences either
embrace or find incredibly boring and pretentious. And,
in the end, that seems to pretty much sum up most of
Bernardo Bertolucci's movies."

Now I know why I warn my students rto stay away from
movie reviewers when they engage in their research for
their papers....

Less a review than a suggestion. I think that when I think
about Bertolucci's approach to making a movie, from the
eight films of his I've seen, a key word in my mind would be
intuitive. This is not to imply that he approaches a movie
helter-skelter; his films are beautifully put together (as a
retired movie person, I know the demanding preproduction
work this takes). But being fully prepared with a
pre-visualized concept and being intuitive means that he
takes his time with his stories. Since the movies of his
I've seen, almost all that is, have multiple layers of
storyline, they are not so easily accessible as the majority
of films made. So my suggestion would be for your critics to
see "The Sheltering Sky" a couple of times more. Virtually
nothing in this film is there for cosmetics and as one sees
it more than once the unifying forces of the story are
revealed as a single and fully realized entity.

This review is not very fair to Bertolucci´s cinema, not even to Sheltering sky. When I saw the movie for the first time, I really found it a little dull and pretentious. But in a second and then in a third view, the movie was a kind of revelation to me, for its strange couple, its dive into cultural abyss, its photography, its pathos which the so-called boredom only disguises. It´s Debra Winger´s best role and acting and Malcovich, dying on that fort swept by the desert winds, is something I won´t forget. Each time I see this filme, I see more.