VIsconti has a history with Burt Lancaster; he made "The Leopard", the story of Garibaldi, with him ove ten years earlier. Lancaster was a younger and more vigorous man at that time. Visconti, the writers, and Lancaster have some very interesting and accurate insights to the aging process for the type of man that Lancaster portrays. He is a refined gentleman. The people he comes into contact with are, by any definition, vulgar and crude. However, they do possess something that the professor does not possess at this point in his life; the visceral enjoyment and pain of contrasting emotions. It is these contrasting emotions, love and hate, joy and agony, among others that the professor strangely is attracted to in the form of a young man he becomes a mentor to. As a man about the same (or older) than the professor (and a professor to boot lol), I can commiserate with Lancaster's character. This is Visconti's most introspective film; be sure to catch it.
Review of Conversation Piece
