Conversation Piece cover art

Conversation Piece Details

1974 Certificate 18
  • Rated:
  • 60
  • from 351 members

Burt Lancaster plays an aging college professor who rents a Roman palazzo only to find the upstairs occupied by an Italian family. With his quiet life disrupted he becomes involved in a web of murder and intrigue. Read more

Starring Burt Lancaster, Helmut Berger
Director Luchino Visconti
Genres Drama

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Conversation Piece

Burt Lancaster plays an aging college professor who rents a Roman palazzo only to find the upstairs occupied by an Italian family. With his quiet life disrupted he becomes involved in a web of murder and intrigue.

Starring Burt Lancaster, Helmut Berger
Director Luchino Visconti
Studio ARROW FILMS
Run time DVD: 2 hrs
Certificate Certificate 18
Genres Drama
Language DVD: English
Released DVD: 30 Jun 2003
Production year: 1974
Format DVD
  • Critics' reviews (3) of Conversation Piece

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  • 3 stars out of 5

    Luchino Visconti, having suffered a major stroke that confined him to a wheelchair, concocted this story about an ageing, homosexual professor who lives surrounded by art and books. Cut off from the real world both physically and intellectually, he finds his ivory tower invaded when a countess and her jet-setting brood rent the apartment upstairs. All the usual Visconti themes — the collision of cultures, the clash between old and new, the imminence of death — are covered in his customary opulent fashion. The film reunited the director with Burt Lancaster, who starred in The Leopard.

    • Radio Times
  • A parable about the approach of death, this centres around a slightly Prospero-like professor (Lancaster incarnating a... read more on Time Out

    • Time Out
  • Most helpful member's review of Conversation Piece

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  • 7 out of 7 people found this review helpful

    Rated - 5 stars

    the best film ever!

    This has class. Everything is perfect; the acting, the set, the incredible sensuality. All the actors are fabulous but Helmut Berger is fascinating and harrowingly beautiful. Every aspect of life is expressed in this masterpiece. This is not a film for everyone though. You need to be well versed in Art and culture and have a taste for sophistication.

    This film is also a subtle fable about the dangers of far right-wing fanatics

      • A customer from Paris, France
  • Most recent members' review of Conversation Piece

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  • 2 out of 2 people found this review helpful

    Rated - 3 stars [Highly rated reviewer]

    Family group in an interior

    Is the literal Italian title for this film and better reflects the action on screen. Visconti's main focus here is to observe what happens to an elderly and reclusive professor when his ordered life is sujected to powerful external forces; in this case a disfunctional 1970's family. He is bullied by the Countess, a wonderful creation of feminine power and manipulative charm, her young German lover and her two precocious teenage children who also enjoy the sexual charms of her lover. The professor is both repelled and irrisistably drawn to this 'family' with fairly predictable results. Modern audiences may be rather perplexed by the polital references which are never fully explored. And the claustrophobic interior settings where all the action (or inaction) takes place could be a bit boring. The English dubbing is less than ideal and produces an odd distancing effect (except for Burt Lancaster whose good old american english is left undisturbed). My verdict is that I liked this film and it is a must see for all of us who are interested in Visconti's films.

      • Zamy from London
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Rating breakdown

351 Member ratings
  • 100
20
  • 90
21
  • 80
52
  • 70
58
  • 60
60
  • 50
37
  • 40
34
  • 30
26
  • 20
30
  • 10
13

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    • Burt Lancaster plays an aging college professor who rents a Roman palazzo only to find the upstairs occupied by an Italian family. With his quiet life disrupted he becomes involved in a web of murder ...