All language subtitles for The.So-called.Caryatids.1984.FRENCH.1080p.BluRay.H264.AAC-VXT.eng

The So-Called Caryatids

THE SO-CALLED CARYATIDS

On the street, a nude is more often
in bronze than alive,

in stone than in the flesh.

And we aren't surprised
by unclad ladies

brightening sidewalks or buildings
gracefully and lasciviously.

Tell me, O Venus

What pleasure do you find

In causing my virtue
to come cascading down?

More than the sexy flower-women
and sirens, pale or bronzed...

I like the statues
that serve as human columns...

bearers of doors, lintels,
capitals, or balconies.

The so-called caryatids.

The Roman architect Vitruvius
tells of their origin.

The Peloponnesian city of Karyes

sided with Persia
in a war with the Greeks.

The Greek victors took revenge
on the Karyatian collaborators.

They destroyed their city,
slew their men,

and carried their women off as slaves.

The women were paraded
triumphantly as spoils of war —

at least the noble women,
in their lovely gowns and finery.

To show how the traitors
had been punished...

architects used this sort of statue

instead of columns on public buildings

The incident faded from memory,
but the caryatids had been born.

Here we'll only see...

Parisian caryatids
of the late 19th century.

They occur in pairs,
clothed or nude.

Often one is half naked,
while the other isn't.

They're symmetrical
but never identical.

Except for a male-female pair
on Avenue de Tourville,

Paris has a dozen male pairs
of these "almost twins"

and about 50 female pairs.

There are even triplets

supporting the heavy pediment
of this large bank.

Here four columnar ladies
have become 12.

He bears this building alone,
with just one hand.

Male caryatids are called atlantes,

in memory of Atlas carrying
the world on his shoulders.

"My dad's the strongest,
and my mom's the prettiest."

The statues convey
the same message.

The men are strong and muscular.

So we must see the muscles...

and the strain...

and the facial tension.

An atlas conveys force and power.

When women bear a load,
it's usually on their head, casually.

A woman carrying
a basket on her head

is a serene sculpture all on its own.

I've photographed them
in my travels.

In Portugal, for example.

A caryatid is not meant
to display support or effort.

She's a specific concept
of woman in architecture.

Returning to classicism
was once again fashionable.

Leconte de Lisle wrote
his Ancient Poems.

Théodore de Banville published
his first verses, The Caryatids.

But it's precisely
between 1860 and 1870

that caryatids appeared
on buildings.

That prodigious decade also produced
Hugo's Les Misérables...

Offenbach's La Belle Hélène,
Marx's Das Kapital...

Flaubert's
Sentimental Education...

Delacroix's last works
and Manet's first,

which were as scandalous as
Les Fleurs de mal by Baudelaire...

the poet of poets...

who sang of women and suffering
as no one else has.

"I am beautiful, O mortals,
like a dream carved in stone

And my breast,
where mortals come to grief

Is made to inspire
in the poet a love

as eternal and silent as matter."

"I am fair and I command

That for love of me
you love only Beauty

I am your guardian angel,
your muse, your madonna"

"What will you say tonight,
poor solitary soul

What will you say,
my once withered heart

To the fairest, kindest,
dearest of women

Whose divine glance
suddenly revived you?"

Baudelaire wooed
Madame Sabatier for years.

He'd send her poems —
anonymous at first, later signed.

One night after a trial concerning
Les Fleurs de mal,

she finally gave herself to him.

The next day he broke off
with her in a letter.

"A few days ago
you were a goddess,

which is very convenient,
beautiful, and inviolable.

Now you are a woman."

One could cry.

But I cry even more
over Baudelaire's last two years.

In 1866 he was 45 and famous,

but also poor,
worn out, bitter, and ill.

A fall in a church left him
a mute hemiplegic.

Though mute,
at times he could form words.

"Damn it! Damn it all!"

He died 18 months later,
still mute.

"Angel full of gaiety,
do you know anguish

Shame, remorse,
sobs, and vexations

And the vague terrors
of those frightful nights

That press on the heart
like a paper one crumples?

Angel of gaiety,
do you know anguish?"

"Angel full of kindness,
do you know hatred

Fists clenched in the dark,
bile-filled tears

When Vengeance issues
his hellish call to arms

And makes himself
captain of our faculties?

Angel of kindness,
do you know hatred?"

One rarely notices
this strange angel on Rue Turbigo

when leaving the office
for housing assistance

and small homeowners' aid.

The neighbors we spoke to

seem never to have noticed
this giant caryatid.

Or they never think about it.

They only know that
the French victory at Turbigo in 1859

gave the street its name.

Could she be related
to the decorative textile industry,

given her tasseled bag?

They call her "the Lady with the Bag"
or "Fortune with Myrrh"...

or "the Odd Angel."

No one knows who created her...

or what she represents.

"Mask or ornament, hail!
I adore your beauty."