Marat/Sade

I just got done watching this movie on Netflix Instant and it's pretty incredible.

It's based on a 1967 originally called "The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade," eventually shortened to Marat/Sade.

The movie is set in 1808, 15 years after the French Revolution, and it's about the Marquis de Sade putting on a play he wrote about Jean-Paul Marat. Almost every actor is playing two characters. The mentally ill inmates of the asylum and the role they're given to play in Sade's play. The director doesn't cheat because he has the freedom of it being a movie. Everything takes place in a single barred room. The inmates have limited props and effects to work with. The plot of the play is about Marat's murder, but it's really about the nature of revolution, classes, government and other issues.

Of course, you can apply it all to the Revolution, Napoleonic France in 1808 and today. During Marat and Sade's monologues I could only think of Occupy Wall Street. Granted, Occupy Wall Street is thankfully most bloodless, but it still resonates.

It's a complex movie that might be a little dry for some, but has an interesting concept and a lot of interesting ideas. Oh, and it's partially a musical.

Funnily enough, since last sunday there's been a few rumblings about people walking out of a Royal Shakespeare Company production of this and I knew the title was familiar from somewhere and yep, I first heard about it right here.