Tinto Brass, Director of Erotic Epics ‘Caligula’ and ‘Salon Kitty,’ Dies at 93

Italian director Tinto Brass, known for the historic erotic epics “Salon Kitty” and “Caligula,” has died. He was 93.

Brass’ family announced the news of his death on Wednesday to Italian press agency Ansa.

Born in Milan in 1933 to a Venetian family of artists, Brass first studied law before veering towards film during the late 1950s. He wound up as an archivist at the Cinémathèque Francais in Paris, where he met Roberto Rossellini and worked as an assistant on Rossellini’s war drama “General della Rovere.”

Brass made his directorial debut in 1963 with the Venice-set tale “In Capo Al Mondo,” later retitled “Chi Lavora è Perduto,” about a young unemployed man with antisocial tendencies that received enthusiastic acclaim at the Venice Film Festival. The film, however, ran into big problems with Italian censors in what became the first of many battles Brass faced with censorship for various reasons.

Brass spent the large part of the late 1960s and early 1970s in London shooting several English-language films, including 1967 erotic pop thriller “Deadly Sweet,” starring Jean-Louis Trintignant and Sweden’s Ewa Aulin. Trintignant stars as a young man who discovers that his business contact has been murdered. Instead of calling the police, he decides to protect a young woman, played by Aulin, at the crime scene and pursue the real killers‚ which puts him on a collision course with the London underworld.

“Deadly Sweet” was presented out-of-competition at the 1967 Venice International Film Festival. The restored version played at Venice earlier this year as a tribute to Brass. It was followed by “Attraction” (1969) and “Dropout” (1970).

Brass broke out internationally with erotic war drama “Salon Kitty” (1976), set in a high-class Berlin brothel used by the Nazi intelligence service and starring Helmut Berger. But his best known film outside Italy is “Caligula,” which was made in 1979 and released in 1984 in a different cut from that intended by Brass. The contentious film was self-financed in 1980 by Penthouse founder Bob Guccione, who after fighting with Brass and screenwriter Gore Vidal, wrested control of the project and tossed out the script. He added adult content that he shot after the actors — which included Helen Mirren, Malcolm McDowell, John Gielgud and Peter O’Toole — had finished their shoots, prompting Brass and Vidal to sue to have their names removed from the picture.

In 1983, Brass helmed “The Key,” an adaptation of a novel by Japanese author Tanizaki Junichiro starring Stefania Sandrelli, in a move towards more highbrow eroticism that played well globally. It was followed by other works focused on the journey of sexual liberation of their female characters, including “Black Angel” (2002) and “Fallo” (2003).

Brass is survived by his wife, Caterina Varzi, and children Bonifacio and Beatrice Brass.