Luchino Visconti’s "Death in Venice" (Brookline, February 21)

The Coolidge Corner Theatre will present legendary Italian director Luchino Visconti’s 1971 Death in Venice on Monday, February 21 at 7pm. In Visconti’s lush and haunting version of Thomas Mann’s novella, an artist obsessed by his ideal of physical and spiritual beauty jeopardizes his own life to be near the object of his desire. Playing Count Aschenbach, Dirk Bogarde embodies the outwardly civilized and meticulously reserved composer as he takes a rest cure in Edwardian Venice. The dichotomy between the intellectual and the sensual is brought to the fore by Aschenbach’s first glimpse of the beautiful young Tadzio, unleashing a secret obsession. The Count’s fascination with the youth’s physical perfection is mirrored in Visconti's masterful visual style.

This presentation is part of the Coolidge’s ongoing Science on Screen series. Before the film, guest speaker Nancy Etcoff, a faculty member of the Harvard Medical School and the Harvard University Mind/Brain/Behavior Initiative and a psychologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, discusses the science of beauty. Dr. Etcoff has conducted research on the perception of beauty, emotion, well-being, and the brain for over 20 years. Her critically acclaimed popular science book, Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty has been published in over a dozen languages, and was the subject of a one-hour Discovery Channel program.

Tickets: $9.75 general admission/$7.75 students and Museum of Science members, and free for Coolidge members. For more information and advance tickets, visit www.coolidge.org.