---
product_id: 22378123
title: "Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD]"
price: "517 Lei"
currency: RON
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 12
url: https://www.desertcart.ro/products/22378123-trilogy-of-life-the-decameron-the-canterbury-tales-arabian-nights
store_origin: RO
region: Romania
---

# Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD]

**Price:** 517 Lei
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

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- **What is this?** Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD]
- **How much does it cost?** 517 Lei with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.ro](https://www.desertcart.ro/products/22378123-trilogy-of-life-the-decameron-the-canterbury-tales-arabian-nights)

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## Description

In the early 1970s, the great Italian poet, philosopher, and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini (Salò, or The 120 Days of Sodom) brought to the screen a trio of masterpieces of premodern world literature—Giovanni Boccaccio’s The Decameron, Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, and The Thousand and One Nights (often known as The Arabian Nights)—and in doing so created his most uninhibited and extravagant work, which he titled his Trilogy of Life. In this brazen and bawdy triptych, the director set out to challenge consumer capitalism and celebrate the uncorrupted human body while commenting on contemporary sexual and religious mores and hypocrisies. His scatological humor and rough-hewn sensuality leave all modern standards of decency behind; these are physical, provocative, and wildly entertaining films, all extraordinarily designed by Dante Ferretti (Hugo) and featuring evocative music by Ennio Morricone (Days of Heaven).The Decameron Pasolini weaves together stories from Giovanni Boccaccio’s fourteenth-century moral tales in this picturesque free-for-all. The Decameron explores the delectations and dark corners of an earlier and, as the filmmaker saw it, less compromised time. Among the chief delights are a young man’s exploits with a gang of grave robbers, some randy nuns who sin with a strapping gardener, and Pasolini’s appearance as a pupil of the painter Giotto, at work on a massive fresco. One of the director’s most popular films, The Decameron, trans­posed to Naples from Boccaccio’s Florence, is a cutting takedown of the pieties surrounding religion and sex. 1971 111 minutes Color Monaural In Italian with English subtitles 1.85:1 aspect ratioThe Canterbury Tales Eight of Geoffrey Chaucer’s lusty tales come to life on-screen in Pasolini’s gutsy and delirious The Canterbury Tales, which was shot in England and offers a remarkably earthy re-creation of the medieval era. From the story of a nobleman struck blind after marrying a much younger and ultimately promiscuous bride to a climactic trip to a hell populated by friars and demons (surely one of the most outrageously conceived and realized sequences ever committed to film), this is an unendingly imaginative work of merry blasphemy, framed by Pasolini’s portrayal of Chaucer himself. 1972 111 minutes Color Monaural In Italian with English subtitles 1.85:1 aspect ratioArabian Nights Pasolini traveled to Africa, India, and the Middle East to realize this ambitious cinematic treatment of a handful of the stories from the legendary The Thousand and One Nights. This is not the fairy-tale world of Scheherazade or Aladdin or Ali Baba—instead, the director focuses on the more erotic tales, ones of desire, betrayal, and atonement, framed by the story of a young man’s quest to reconnect with his beloved slave girl. Full of lustrous sets and costumes and stunning location photography, Arabian Nights is a fierce and joyous exploration of human sensuality. 1974 130 minutes Color Monaural In Italian with English subtitles 1.85:1 aspect ratio

Review: trilogy of perfection - obviously the director is known for making some still controversial films, however, if a film is watched with a respectful open mind and the whole piece is digested one begins to appreciate the beauty in the film. to me all three films can be appreciated as a whole. i'm not going to recount every film and every scene but rather say that when watching these films it really feels like you're genuinely taken somewhere foreign, exotic and grandiose. the settings and timing in these films are rich and alive. everything feels like somebody really telling you foreign stories where it feels like you can visualize being far away from reality. the question of abundant sexuality has to be taken into the context of each scene and one has to appreciate that its not a the center of the whole like pornography but is rather sensual if not at times comedic and does not ever cheapen the art which are these films. masterful cinema and beautifully restored by the criterion group.
Review: Works that are indeed comical, but philosophically challenge our understanding of past times - A classic. Three works reflecting a revisionist interpretation of a long-past time. Variation of approach is to be considered as much of our understanding of the Middle Ages is of a conventional portrayal which we cannot know to be either accurate nor even terribly helpful. Seeing the past in terms which assault our expectations may ultimately not only help to see the present from a Leftist view in its portrayal of the past, but also reflects on the assumptions we hold of the past which are neither provable nor clearly worthwhile. It is good to take the very limited material that we have from the past and even its considerably selected presentation favoring the rich and the leaders so that we can more openly look to times which often may well have been quite different from how we generally understand them. People do change, and yet to a good extent motivations, conflicts and much of family and local interactions may not change all too much at some granular level.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| ASIN  | B008Y5OXB0 |
| Actors  | Pier Paolo Pasolini |
| Aspect Ratio  | 1.85:1 |
| Best Sellers Rank | #87,121 in Movies & TV ( See Top 100 in Movies & TV ) #13,729 in Drama DVDs |
| Customer Reviews | 4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars (157) |
| Director  | Pier Paolo Pasolini |
| Item model number  | CRRN2195DVD |
| MPAA rating  | NR (Not Rated) |
| Media Format  | Box set, Color, Multiple Formats, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen |
| Number of discs  | 4 |
| Product Dimensions  | 0.7 x 7.5 x 5.4 inches; 9.92 ounces |
| Release date  | November 13, 2012 |
| Run time  | 5 hours and 52 minutes |
| Studio  | Criterion Collection |
| Subtitles:  | English |

## Product Details

- **Contributor:** Pier Paolo Pasolini
- **Format:** Box set, Color, Multiple Formats, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
- **Genre:** Drama
- **Language:** Italian
- **Number Of Discs:** 4

## Images

![Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD] - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81R6lPD2B7L.jpg)
![Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD] - Image 2](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81DZHxTwj2L.jpg)
![Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD] - Image 3](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81Q9MQz3xML.jpg)
![Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD] - Image 4](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/813yxlRIAaL.jpg)
![Trilogy of Life (The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Arabian Nights) (The Criterion Collection) [DVD] - Image 5](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81hKtS5K2VL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ trilogy of perfection
*by C***T on December 21, 2021*

obviously the director is known for making some still controversial films, however, if a film is watched with a respectful open mind and the whole piece is digested one begins to appreciate the beauty in the film. to me all three films can be appreciated as a whole. i'm not going to recount every film and every scene but rather say that when watching these films it really feels like you're genuinely taken somewhere foreign, exotic and grandiose. the settings and timing in these films are rich and alive. everything feels like somebody really telling you foreign stories where it feels like you can visualize being far away from reality. the question of abundant sexuality has to be taken into the context of each scene and one has to appreciate that its not a the center of the whole like pornography but is rather sensual if not at times comedic and does not ever cheapen the art which are these films. masterful cinema and beautifully restored by the criterion group.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Works that are indeed comical, but philosophically challenge our understanding of past times
*by C***S on January 25, 2025*

A classic. Three works reflecting a revisionist interpretation of a long-past time. Variation of approach is to be considered as much of our understanding of the Middle Ages is of a conventional portrayal which we cannot know to be either accurate nor even terribly helpful. Seeing the past in terms which assault our expectations may ultimately not only help to see the present from a Leftist view in its portrayal of the past, but also reflects on the assumptions we hold of the past which are neither provable nor clearly worthwhile. It is good to take the very limited material that we have from the past and even its considerably selected presentation favoring the rich and the leaders so that we can more openly look to times which often may well have been quite different from how we generally understand them. People do change, and yet to a good extent motivations, conflicts and much of family and local interactions may not change all too much at some granular level.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Finally!
*by S***U on June 8, 2013*

Pasolini holds a special place for me in the canon, not on a technical or even artistic level, but as real and as human a filmmaker as ever worked. It's splendid that Criterion has taken these films, restored them, explained them, and given them better subtitles that some of the older versions. Truly a masterful work, the Trilogy of Life deals with sex, murder, inequity, disappointment, reward, honor, truth, lies, fate, will-- in ways that are distasteful, and happily so-- just like, well, life... Along with Salo, the extreme denial of life and the terror of pragmatic manipulation, I have never seen anything that so honestly and openly defies all suppositions, even at its cinematic worst. Thank God for Criterion! Now, if they could get to work on the rest of Pier Paolo's catalogue, I'd gladly make them a couple hundred dollars richer; for my subsequent poverty, I have Pasolini.

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*Product available on Desertcart Romania*
*Store origin: RO*
*Last updated: 2026-02-25*