*Warning: This review contains plot spoilers.

After over a year of listening to my critique partner tell me I must see The Sheltering Sky, a 1990 film based on the novel of the same name by Paul Bowles. I finally was able to order it from B&N. 

 First off, being a film by Bernardo Bertolucci, you know it's going to be on a grand scale.  And he doesn't disappoint. Immediately, you're drawn in, almost as if you're there, witnessing the events as they unfold.  And the cinematography is amazing. The contrast between the orange-gold of the sand and the intense cerulean blue of the sky is almost too much for the human eye to comprehend. 

 But as much as it pains me, I have to say, Kit and Port Moresby are two of the most incredibly stupid people ever to walk across the screen. After doing a little more research on Paul Bowles and the book, which I haven't read yet, I realize that it was his intention to portray them that way.

The whole premise of the movie is that  Kit and Port go to the Sahara to try and rekindle the love they feel they have lost.  Taking a friend who's obviously in love with Kit doesn't seem like the kind of thing to help, but they do it anyway.

After an argument with Kit, Port leaves their hotel and is lured across the city to the camp of some Berber tribesmen, where he meets a beautiful young woman who soothes his wounded male pride.  When he catches her trying to steal his wallet, she calls down the wrath of her kinsmen and Port barely escapes with his life.

In retaliation, Kit has a one night stand with Tunner, their uninvited tagalong guest. 

Port is no idiot. He truly loves his wife and knows that he must get her away from Tunner.  So, they leave him behind while they head to a new destination. It is then that Port becomes sick.  When Port is too ill to continue their journey, they stop at a French garrison for him to receive medical care.  It is then , while she's tenderly caring for him, spooning broth and medicine in him, that Kit realizes how much her husband means to her. How empty her life would be without him.  When the strain of nursing her sick husband becomes too much, Kit steps outside the garrison to watch the camel caravans crossing the desert below them. She is fascinated by them.

Deep in his delirium from Typhoid fever, Port comes to the conclusion that Kit is lost to him.  During one brief sentient moment, he tells her he has always lived for her, because of her, and now she's left him. He has no desire to continue living. Despite her frantic, tearful reassurances that she's still there and will always be there,  Port loses his will to fight the disease and dies.  

It is at this point where Kit just drops her basket. Instead of being a responsible adult, she runs away, leaving her husband's lifeless body behind, she packs one suitcase and her pith helmet and legs it.  She's picked up by a camel caravan led by a mysterious, intriguing Tuareg named Belqassim.   Eventually, Kit discards her western clothing, adopting instead the garb of a Tuareg man.  And she takes Belqassim as her lover. They travel for weeks before arriving at the remote Saharan village  where his family lives.

Kit is promptly whisked away to an isolated rooftop room, where Belqassim visits her on the sly.  His wives become suspicious of this mysterious person living above their heads and sends one of the children to spy and report back to them.  They are so enraged that their husband/father has taken a  lover that they cast Kit out into the streets, where, catatonic, she's taken to the nearest hospital.

 A representative from the American Embassy finds her and takes her back to where they'd originally arrived in Africa and tells her that her friend, Tunner,  is there waiting for her.  The moment she is able, Kit escapes and the last we see of her is walking down the street and into a bar.

 All in all, I found this movie to be thoroughly depressing, despite the beautiful photography, costumes, landscapes and the breathtakingly handsome Belqassim.  Early on, I sensed that Kit was going to lose Port if she didn't wake up and realize the depth of his love for her.  She seemed to want to, but not badly enough. 

And Port came across as rather masochistic and possibly suicidal.  He knew Tunner was after his wife, yet he allowed him to accompany them on the journey. He knew the whore would try to rob him, but still he went to her.  He knew he was sick,yet persisted in forging deeper and deeper into the Sahara where  there would be no medical help.  

If pressed to give a brief description of this movie, I would call it a Cautionary Tale.   Be careful what you ask for, you might just get it.