Better the Second Time Around

Re-watched The Conformist last night at the New Beverly - very watchable the 2nd time around. I followed the plot this time and finally understand everything that happened. It is obviously one of the most beautiful films ever made - one of the films that makes me think Cinema can achieve the status of art, as an object outside that transcends this world...or some other pretentious bullshit like that.

But I enjoyed this story this time, about an old student being sent to assassinate his old professor, a subversive fighting the fascists. The would be assassin is not a fascist, but rather a conformist, someone interested in being "normal," a malleable, pathetic, mediocre, little soul, an abused child who has others do his dirty work, a coward. A spy movie...