The Night Porter (1974). Embassy Pictures.
There are certain actresses that are referred to as “America’s Sweetheart” — Charlotte Rampling isn’t one of them. Instead of “feel good movies”, she often picks dark dramas that show an uncomfortable and uneasy side to human nature. Her roles are too troubling to be “likeable”, but her performances are unforgettable. It comes as no surprise then why the Berlinale is paying homage to the five-decade film veteran with an Honorary Golden Bear at this year’s instalment of the film festival
The British-born actress started out in modelling, becoming a favourite muse of photographer Helmut Newton, who is famous for portraying women as equal parts strong and sexual. Rampling got her first big break in Italian cinema as Elisabeth Thallman, the wife of a Nazi-era German businessman who gets sent to a concentration camp, in Luchino Visconti’s The Damned (1969), which explored the greed, decadence and depravity of pre-war Germany. For much of the world, it was an introduction to Rampling’s distinctive face with its sculpted cheekbones, and her hooded eyes that would go on to steal scenes with their expressive silence.
Arguably, her most controversial role came in the mid ’70s with the erotic psychodrama The Nightporter (1974). Here, Rampling once again plays a concentration camp inmate, but this time, engages in a sadomasochistic relationship with an SS doctor that continues when they meet again after the war. She performs the iconic cabaret number “Wenn ich mir was wünchen dürfte” while wearing suspenders and a Nazi cap. The striking (and complicated) sartorial language of this moment went on to inspire a plethora of artists and designers, including Marc Jacobs, Raf Simons and Tom Ford, and punk legend, Siouxsie Sioux.
The ’80s brought a crossover into mainstream American cinema with Woody Allen’s Stardust Memories (1980), which featured Rampling as one of Allen’s tempestuous ex-lovers, disproving the notion of an “ideal woman”. She also starred opposite Paul Newman in The Verdict (1982) as a femme fatale sent to seduce and betray an alcoholic lawyer trying to defend a medical malpractice case. One of her more bizarre films came in 1986 with Nagisa Oshima’s surprisingly serious, Max mon amour, where Rampling plays a diplomat’s wife who takes a chimpanzee for a lover.
Rampling’s career has not faded as the years have gone by. In the new millennium, she found herself once again playing muse, but this time to director François Ozon, who led the actress to award nominations in her late fifties with films like Under the Sand (2000) and Swimming Pool (2003). She also hasn’t shied away from subversive erotic roles, playing a sex tourist in Laurent Cantet’s 2005 film Vers le sud. Although her model figure was a great asset in her early career, her sex symbol status goes deeper than the skin, lying somewhere in the hypnotic stare of her light coloured eyes that shift between grey, green and blue.
For more information about this year’s HOMAGE and Honorary Golden Bear for Charlotte Rampling, visit the Berlinale website here.
All images courtesy of the Berlinale.