Heartbreaking documentary by Kristina Lindstrom and Kristian Petri about Bjorn Andresen, who won the part of Tadzio in Luchino Visconti’s 1971 Death in Venice. Visconti went on a world-wide search for the beautiful object of obsession for Dirk Bogarde’s Gustav von Aschenbach. The shots of all these young boys trotted out in front of Visconti in schools across Europe is weird enough but when shy, teenage Bjorn Andresen is asked to remove his shirt in front of the director and his staff your skin begins to crawl.
Visconti warned his whole crew that it was “hands off” Andresen during the making of the film, but afterwards Bjorn was catapulted to dizzying stardom. In Japan, the androgynous-looking Bjorn became a pop legend and was memorialized in Manga comics.
But the documentary investigates the tragedies and inner demons that followed Andresen afterwards. One’s heart is broken by many of his stories and as we follow the bedraggled, long-haired Andresen smoking in his apartment and wistfully chronicling his difficult life.
It’s hard to say this is a cautionary tale because it’s impossible to imagine the same kind of convergence of elements of child stardom, but this film will haunt your dreams.
(Opening this Friday Sept. 24th at the Quad Cinema).
In the mid 70s when I lived in LA, I went to a fashion show with some friends at the Hollywood Palladium. We were early so we went upstairs to the bar and seated there was Bjorn Andresen.
I recognized him from Death in Venice and, yes, he was the most beautiful boy in the world!