THE RED VIOLIN (1998)

This movie takes audiences through the story of a beautiful instrument – from its creation in 1600’s Italy to its moment on the auction block in modern day Montreal. Of course, with a violin as the star of the film, it’s only natural that one of the highlights of this movie is a lush and magical score. The music is combined with fairy tale like settings – including a rustic abbey, a lush country manor, and labyrinth Asian alleyways - and through five separate stories makes for an absorbing and sensual movie.

Two of my favorite storylines in The Red Violin were the story of the violin’s inception and the Oxford leg of its journey. As the movie starts, a handful of men labor in a sawdust-filled workshop in Cremona, creating curvy and delicate violins. The master of these artisans is Niccolo Bussoti. He is so excited by his wife’s pregnancy that he has created his finest violin for his unborn son and promises his wife that their child will make beautiful music to delight the world. They live in a warm Italian home, complete with a giant and inviting kitchen, and wear lovely, bright colored clothes that drape in elegant folds. This comfortable life comes to a crashing halt when Niccolo’s wife and child die during childbirth. In his mourning, he paints his son’s violin with an intense shade of red.While this story ends in tragedy, the love between the couple resulted in the creation of a beautiful and one-of-a-kind piece of art.

Eventually, the violin ends up in the hands of a dashing redhead named Frederick Pope. He composes music on his violin while making passionate love to his muse, a golden haired writer named Victoria. When he plays live in an airy concert hall, he plays with such lust that you can almost hear buttons popping off of the dresses of women in the audience. So urgent is his playing, it seems as if he is making love to the violin itself. Back at his manor, he asks Victoria to help him clear a mental block. Her hair cascading down her back, she strips off her clothes and caresses Frederick as he plays wildly. It’s an incredibly sensual moment but it is followed by Victoria’s announcement that she must go to Russia to pursue the end of her novel. Once parted, the two write aching love letters to each other, beginning with “Darling” and then going on to speak of how they wish they could touch, how they long for each other.

While these two stories are the ones that stuck out most for me, as a whole the movie has many elements that make it sensual overall. The music, the atmosphere, the romance, the different settings, and the mystery and intrigue that follow the violin all result in a gorgeous film. While on the one hand I though Samuel L. Jackson’s care for the violin bordered on obsessive, it also wasn’t hard to see why he had fallen in love with the Red Violin. Its beauty permeates the movie and its fascinating history makes it a perfect selection to add to Barefoot Aphrodite’s collection.