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In some ways, Luchino Visconti's film, Death In Venice (1971) follows a Victorian chastity despite the controversy that prudes and haters have raised against both the film, and Thomas Mann's novella of the same name.  Set in the early twentieth century, at a luxury hotel in Venise that fronts on a beach, the film features many beautiful glimpses of the beach attendans employed by the hotel, and the two young men, Tadzio and Jaschu---who, apparently, are boyfriends.  Whether this is only a summer romance, or not, is not immediately clear; but (spoiler alert) toward the end of the film, and at novella, the relationship is demolished when Jaschu becomes aggresively beligerent.  I, for one, think this is an artificial imposition on the story, a concession to the aforesaid old prudes and haters.  Because it is witnessed when the POV character, Von Aschenbach (in the novella, a writer like Mann himself; in the film, a composer) is already feverish with the cholera that (spoiler alert) will kill him at the end of the film, it may very welll be a feverish version of his wishful thinking .  . . to remove Jaschu from Tadzio in order to more fully enjoy Tadzio's beauty without interference of a third party.  Because Von Aschenbach is so very ill, one can concede to him a little latitude in his febrile imagiinings, but I think the novella and the film both fail, artistically, by driving a wedge between Tadzio and Jaschu without, subsequently, repairing the damage.

     Lest any prudes and haters reading this take offense, let me emphasize here that, ar no rime and in no way, does Von Aschebach ever touch Tadzio in any way either appropriate (a handshake, for instance) or inappropriate.  Through the film, they exchange glances (with the implication that Tadzio is aware of his own beauty, and aware of how much it has attracted Von Aschenbach), and a very few words.

     Much of the film features the beach, an applaudable strategy on Visconti's part, because he has selected some really beautiful young men, including Tadzio and Jaschu, to appear there---barefoot, although their swimming attire covers them from theiir shoulders to their thighs below the pubic area.  Unlike our contemporary beaches, no flesh above the lower thighs is featured---no topless torsos, no thongs or bikini bottoms.  The beach attire is extremely chaste, in keeping with the Victorian morality that was still influential in Europe; but they are all---I might emphasize enthusiastically---barefoot.  Especially Tadzio:  I have not been able to complete a time study of the various scenes, but I have a distinct impression that he appears more at the beach than at the hotel (where he is seen mostly at meals with his family).  Fairly early in the film, Jaschu puts his arm around Tadzio and gives him a kiss.  The fact that this young couple, obviously comfortable with their Homosexuality to kiss in full view of anyone on the beach, are parted toward the end in such a crude and violent manner leads me not only to believe, but to hope, that the disruption in their relationship is simply Von Aschenbach's febrile imagining as the life force is dissipating within him.  After Jaschu has left him, Tadzio's behavior, walking through the shallows and pointing at something in the sky not visible to the viewer, is very highly symbolic---and, again, leads me to believe that the artist, Von Aschenbach, is recomposing reality in his final thoughs, and that, in the reality of the world depicted in the film, Tadzio and Jaschu have not broken up in that way.  Now everyone who has ever been an adolescent understands that summer romances are fragile, temporary, and often painful at their endings; but they are a part of adolescence, and Tadzio and Jaschu are very obviously adolescents.

     Tadzio was based upon a real young man with whom Thomas Mann had become obsessed and decided to enshrine in a novella as the epitome of Beauty.  Visconti respects and promotes this by casting Bjorn Andresen, who was then advertised as "the most beautiful boy in the world" (I think the case can be made for that, provided David Cassidy, at that time, is included as his American counterpart; David Cassidy, deliberately barefoot in so many of his publicity photographs). 

      One scene, in particular, moves me very deeply:  Tadzio and Jaschu are walking on the beach; Jaschu's arm is around Tadzio's shoulders.  Both are clad for the beach; both barefoot.  And Jaschu puts a kiss on Tadzio's right cheek.  Just a kiss in passing:  but Von Aschenbach sees this, and actually smiles slightly.  Tadzio, beautiful as he is, is happy in this moment with his boyfriend, Jaschu.  This scene should have been repeated at the end of the film so that Von Aschenbach's feverishly dying vision should have been Tadio and Jaschu kissing in the full blossoming of their summer romance.  This would have provided a poetic ending to the novella and the film; the failure to do so reflects---in my own opinion---poorly upon both the novelist and the director.

Starward