«Ricordare è come un po’ morire». La musica di Ennio Morricone nel film Una pura formalità di Giuseppe Tornatore
«Remembering is a bit like dying». Ennio Morricone’s music in A pure formality by Giuseppe Tornatore

Summary/Abstract: Giuseppe Tornatore defines A pure formality (1994) as a turning point in his filmography. It is in fact a film unusual for his style, with special regard to the theme. One night a murder is committed and the great writer On off (Gerard Depardieu) is found in a state of confusion. The man, brought to the local police station, is questioned by a police detective (Roman Polanski), but seems not to remember the recent events of his life. Only with the advancement of interrogation, amid pressing questions, he will regain his memory. My paper aims to consider this last point of the story, the memory effort of the protagonist, by focusing not only on the events staged, but also on the function of the music by Ennio Morricone. The music plays indeed a decisive role in the film, suggesting some particular moods, otherwise impossible to represent: the enigmatic atmosphere that surrounds the characters, the state of restlessness of the protagonist, the paradoxical misunderstanding of the arrest ar all exalted by the music of Morricone, which moves from the idea that «absence of memory = absence of tonality». A music initially formal and dissonant hides short melodies that surface slowly and make up the main theme of the film. The voice of Depardieu sings a lyric (text by Tornatore) that reveals the mystery: «Remembering is a bit like dying, you know it now».

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