Cruel, Usual, Necessary: The Passion of Silvio Narizzano

Daniel Kremer
2024-12-06

"Hey there, Silvio. Why do all the film buffs pass you by? Could it be you just don't try, or is it the pain you share?"
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134 min

Perhaps at first glance, the filmography of Silvio Narizzano appears unremarkable. Thanks to his sleeper hit Georgy Girl (1966), he's known largely as a "one-hit wonder" director. Upon closer inspection, however, likely no other filmmaker used cinema as effectively to exorcise personal demons in ways both ugly and beautiful. And few directors' sensibilities were more gay, both overtly and covertly. Film historian Daniel Kremer is your tour guide through an obscure, perplexing body of work heretofore ignored and often unfairly shunned. Cruel, Usual, Necessary: The Passion of Silvio Narizzano is an essay documentary of discovery.