Valentino (1977)
I FINALLY got my hands on a copy of this movie!!! It cost me 15.00 on Half.com but it was worth it. You see, Valentino was one of my very favorite movies when I was 15 years old. I taped it on channel 17’s “Up All Night” movies. I remember watching it over and over again. I loved Rudolf Nureyev, I loved the legend of Rudolf Valentino and I loved Mama Michelle’s performance as Natascha Rambova! However, it was only recently that I realized that the film I loved so much was actually a butchered cut! The film I loved was only 1 1/2 in length whereas the original ran over 2 hours! Thus began my search for the original. After many months of searching I found it on Half.com and last night I put the video in and I watched it. At first it seemed that the only things that were cut were simple clips of transportation. In the version I saw the characters would just show up…in the original you would see them get in the car and drive.
At around 1/2 way through the movie there was an extensive nude scene that had been removed from my version. Believe it or not, there was full frontal male nudity! Affer rewinding that part a few dozen times, I tired and decided to continue with the rest of the movie. As shocked as I was with that love scene nothing prepared me for the following scene: A prison homosexual rape scene replete with Nureyev falling into a puddle of vomit. The finale of which is Nureyev being forced to pee himself! The rest of the movie is pretty much identical to the version I saw. Despite the more mature nature of the original version, I prefer the butchered channel 17 version best. Had I seen the original at age 15, I think I would have been marred for life. As it is now, I am still slightly disturbed by the prison scene, but at least I know what I had missed.