Pier Paolo Pasolini always has a streak of the documentary filmmaker somewhere in his body of work, where he usually went for expressing his poetic viewpoint on the lower classes (i.e. Mamma Roma) and, later on, the dark fables and tawdry tales of Oedipus Rex and Arabian Nights. If Love Meetings, his only straight documentary feature, isn't completely impressive it may be because in the little moments when he tries for something poetic, oddly enough, like in the numbered transitions, it doesn't really work as well. Those little bits come off as dated 60s stuff. On the contrary though when Pasolini simply takes to the street with a 16mm and a microphone and asks people directly about sex and women's roles and homosexuality and fidelity and freedoms related to all of the above then it gets really interesting. In fact, for a movie relegated to Italian cities and countrysides, with sound-bytes from across the spectrum from college kids to professors (and author Alberto Moravia early on) to farmers in the fields, and done so on the fly and in classic cinema verite style, it doesn't usually feel very old fashioned.Much of what's discussed and dug up by Pasolini (who reveals himself wonderfully here as a solid journalist, something I would have liked to have seen more of in his career after seeing this) can be relatable for today's youth, if only as a cohesive set of opinions and viewpoints and occasional factoids on standards set between men and women and privacy and liberation and so on. To be sure some of it is stuck in its time and place (practically all of the children asked "Where do babies come from?" say the stork, or something involving God or other). But a lot of it is so absorbing because of the generous flow of ideas- it's a wonderfully edited piece, as sometimes crudely constructed as it is, which is part of the point as a true independent production- and Pasolini's determination to get as much as he can at the heart or whatever at sexual relations and societal norms and what's changed over time in Italy and if there can be any more change in the future. It's probably the most obvious example from the director to screen in a sociology class. 8.5/10

I too was disappointed, but not for the reasons cited in the previous comment.Instead, I found the film very hard to follow, with lots of academic buzzwords (interviewer Pasolini refers to "the sex problem" at least 20 times), not all of it subtitled, and subtitles that faded out of legibility against light backgrounds. The movie was visually unappetizing, in part because of inconsistent and often inept camera work, and in part because of a sloppy transfer to tape that washed out the middle tones and often made it hard to see and read people's faces.The most annoying element was the recurrent muting of the voice tracks (and of course the accompanying sub-titles) that was labeled "self-censorship." Was this a comment on official censorship of the time? I get the impression that the most interesting answers were lost to the audience through this process.An interesting and meaty idea from a provocative and often great filmmaker, undercut by directorial inexperience and poor repackaging.

Pasolini filmed this documentary in 1963, looking for an account of sexual life in Italy at a turning point in history. He travels south and north, to towns and countryside, interviewing intellectuals, workers, farmers and kids. The result is a strikingly accurate portrait of diversities in the country, and of inhibitions and problems to talk about a "natural" thing. Between the notable people interviewed, Nobel prize poet Ungaretti, writers Moravia, Cederna, Fallaci, a whole professional football team, and more.What stroke me more is the great journalistic pace of the documentary, the technique of intermixing different areas of the country, a very clever approach. A great work still "modern" nowadays.Sadly amusing the part where Pasolini (an homosexual himself) asked common people an opinion about homosexuality receiving answers of total denigration.

I must admit, my anticipation for Love Meetings was exceedingly great. Being familiar with Pasolini's other works, his use of prostitution, sexual situations and perversities as a drive in his filmmaking and writing, I eagerly awaited the viewing of this documentary on the Italian view of sex in the 1960s. However, the film turned out to be fairly disappointing. Rather than focus on the underside of Italian life that Pasolini is so accustomed to, he rather relies upon asking tiresome questions concerning unwed couples and love's purpose in a relationship, spending little time dealing with homosexuality and prostitution. Although Pasolini does present a wide-ranging view of Italy's attitudes towards sex, from the poor Southern farmer to the Northern elitist to the intellectual, his lack of material and interviews on the truly interesting aspects of Italian sexual life presents a somewhat interesting, albeit dated and flawed, picture.