Conception Pasolini's writing collaborator
Sergio Citti had originally been attached to direct the intended adaptation of the
Marquis de Sade's
The 120 Days of Sodom. During the creation of the first drafts of the script, Pasolini called upon several of his usual collaborators, among them Citti, Claudio Masenza, Antonio Troisi and specially
Pupi Avati. While collaborating with Citti on the script, Pasolini was compelled to transpose the setting of
Salò from 18th-century France (as depicted in de Sade's original book) to the last days of
Benito Mussolini's regime in the Republic of Salò in the spring of 1944. Salò is a toponymical metonymy for the
Italian Social Republic (RSI) (because Mussolini ruled from this northern town rather than from Rome), which was a
puppet state of
Nazi Germany. While writing the script, it was decided between Citti and Pasolini that the latter would direct the project, as Citti had planned to write a separate project after completing
Salò. Pasolini noted his main contribution to Citti's original screenplay as being its "
Dante-esque structure", which Pasolini felt had been de Sade's original intention with the source material. In the film, almost no background is given on the tortured subjects and, for the most part, they almost never speak. Pasolini's depiction of the victims in such a manner was intended to demonstrate the physical body "as a commodity... the annulment of the personality of
the Other." Specifically, Pasolini intended to depict what he described as an "anarchy of power", in which sexual acts and physical abuse functioned as metaphor for the relationship between power and its subjects. Aside from this theme, Pasolini also described the film as being about the "nonexistence of history" as it is seen from Western culture and
Marxism. Interior design was chosen to feature paintings and art by artists such as
Severini,
Duchamp, and
Feininger. Pasolini also stated that the four fascist libertines were written as highly educated characters and were to refer to themes brought up by, among others, Blanchot, Nietzsche, and Klossowski.
Trilogy of death In contrast to his "Trilogy of Life" (
Il Decameron,
I racconti di Canterbury and
Il fiore delle Mille e una notte), Pasolini initially planned
The 120 days of Sodom and
Salò as separate stories, but noting similarity between both concepts – and based on their experiences in the Republic of Salò – conceived the idea of
Salò or the 120 Days of Sodom. Pasolini established that the violent scenes in
Salò were symbolic and reduced the romanticism of his previous films, although knowing that once the film was premiered would be considered as damned. As a continuation, Pasolini planned to make a biographical film about the life of child murderer
Gilles de Rais, but was murdered himself before
Salòs release.
Casting Initially,
Ninetto Davoli was chosen to play Claudio, a young collaborationist, but due to legal problems he had to decline and was replaced by Claudio Troccoli, a young man who had a similarity to Davoli in his first films. Pupi Avati, being the writer, is not officially accredited also due to legal problems. Most of the actors of the cast, although they were natural performers, were non-professionals with minimal or no prior on-camera acting experience. Many of them were models, cast for their willingness to appear naked on-screen.
Franco Merli was considered to be a prototype of the Pasolinian boy. Ezio Manni remembers during filming: "The same with Franco Merli, the guy chosen for having the most beautiful butt. When they reward him by holding the gun to his head, he suddenly protested, he couldn’t handle that scene. And the assistant director had to go and give him a hug." Pasolini regular
Franco Citti was to play one of the soldiers' studs, but he did not appear.
Laura Betti was also going to play Signora Vaccari, but also because of legal problems and prior commitments to
Novecento declined the role, though she doubled the voice of Hélène Surgère in post-production. Uberto Paolo Quintavalle (the Magistrate) was a writer; he knew Pasolini from working on the newspaper
Corriere della Sera. He was chosen for the role because he had all "the characteristics of a decadent intellectual".
Aldo Valletti (the President) was a friend of Pasolini from the time of
Accattone. Giorgio Cataldi (the Bishop), another friend of Pasolini, was a clothes seller in Rome. a neoclassical building on the hills of
Bologna. The interiors were shot in near
Castelfranco Emilia. The noble hall of the building and the courtyard were filmed in the
Cinecittà studios. The town on the
Reno replaces the fictional location in
Marzabotto. Other scenes were filmed in Grand Hotel a Villa Feltrinelli in
Gargnano. The shooting, carried out mainly in the 16th-century Villa Gonzaga-Zani in
Villimpenta in the spring of 1975, was difficult and involved scenes of
homophilia,
coprophagia and
sadomasochism. The acts of torture in the courtyard caused some of the actors to suffer abrasions and burns. Actress Hélène Surgère described the film shoot as "unusual", with nearly 40 actors being on set at any given time, and Pasolini shooting "enormous" amounts of footage. She also noted the mood on the set as "paradoxically jovial and immature" in spite of the content. In-between working, the cast shared large meals of
risotto and also had football games played against the crew of
Bernardo Bertolucci's
Novecento, which was being filmed nearby. It also marked the reconciliation between the then 34-year-old Bertolucci and his old mentor after several disagreements following Pasolini's criticism of
Last Tango in Paris (1972) and his failure to defend it from drastic
censorship measures. During the soccer match against the crew of
Novecento both directors supported their teams, except that while Bertolucci did it from the bench, Pasolini played directly on the field. The crew of
Novecento wore a purple shirt with phosphorescent bands to distract the opponents and had lined up, passing them off as engineers, two players from the youth team of Calcio Parma. The
Salò crew lost 5 to 2 and Pasolini, furious, left the field before the end shouting: "''He doesn't read anything anymore, that guy!''" to Bertolucci. During production, some reels were stolen and the thieves demanded a ransom for their return. Using doubles, the same scenes were reshot but from a different angle. At the trial for Pasolini's murder, it was hypothesized that Pasolini was told the film reels were discovered in
Ostia Lido. He was led there by Pelosi, the accused, and fell victim to an ambush, where he was murdered. However, there is no concrete evidence for this theory.
Post-production Musical score The original music corresponds to
Ennio Morricone interpreted at the piano by Arnaldo Graziosi. Other non-original music was
Carl Orff's
Carmina Burana in
Veris leta facies at the nearly end of the film during
Circle of Blood. Other music was several
Frédéric Chopin's pieces Preludes Op.28 nº 17 and nº4 and Valses Op. 34 nº 2 in La minor.
Dubbing Like most Italian films of the time,
Salò was shot
MOS (without direct sound), with all dialogue and
foley effects dubbed in post-production. The controversy surrounding the production dissuaded the actors playing the Masters to return to loop their lines, so they were all re-dubbed by other (uncredited) actors. French actress Hélène Surgère (Vaccari) had her dialogue dubbed by
Laura Betti.
Alternative endings Pasolini was undecided on what type of conclusion the film should have, to the point of having conceived and shot four different endings: the first was a shot of a red flag in the wind with the words "Love You", but it was abandoned by the director because he thought it "too pompous" and "prone to the ethics of psychedelic youth", which he detested. The second showed all the actors, other than the four gentlemen, the director and his troupe perform a wild dance in a room of the villa furnished with red flags and the scene was filmed with the purpose of using it as a background scene during the credits, but was discarded because it appeared, in the eyes of Pasolini, chaotic and unsatisfactory. Finally, keeping the idea of dance as the summation of carnage, Pasolini chose to mount the so-called final "Margherita", with the two young blackshirts dancing. ==Release==