Umberto Eco, an Italian writer, theoretician and professor, is undoubtedly one of the greatest authors of the twentieth century. Eco is known in wider circles for his first novel The Name of the Rose, published in 1980.
The director Jean-Jacques Annaud in 1986 gave the fans of the novel a movie of the same name with Sean Connery as the main actor. But what distinguishes the novel "The Name of the Rose" is its multilayeredness and multifacetedness, which Eco so perfectly embedded in the criminal genre.
In one monastery in the north of Italy, the monks begin to die under mysterious circumstances. William of Baskerville with his student, a young monk of Adson, comes to the monastery to help solve the mystery. William's primary method of deduction is abduction, the process with which he comes up with logical conclusions. However, while the investigation continues, the mysterious death of the monks continues. The monstrous culprit who stands at the end of the labyrinth is someone whom William would not have thought in madness.
What makes this narrative particularly distinguished is its atmosphere. Umberto Eco as an expert of the Middle Ages chooses this period for the film plot , and the criminal genre is perfect for one of the motive for the development of the story.
The time frame we are following is a period of seven days, and the event cycle opens and closes the arrival and departure of William and Adson. The atmosphere that it pinch is heavy, gloomy, like a fog that clogs the towers of the monastery.
The monks are in constant fear, and the decision on who the killer is, isn't in sight. It was this fear, the dam and the cold that the novel couldn't show, as is the case with the film. The space of the monastery, the ice and the dark room, the dim light, the candlesticks, glitteringly reflects the state of consciousness in the monastery. But, as narrative is dominated by only one law - the law of entropy - the tension that builds up and rises to annihilation will end exactly like that - the burning flame will swallow the real truth.
As far as truth is concerned, Umberto Eco's philosophy is that there is no ultimate truth - the answer to one secret always refers to the other and so ad infinitum. William, who represents a kind of incarnation of Sherlock Holmes, is trying to convey the ultimate truth to all forces and his immense effort. Given that the faithful screenplay of a literary work is impossible - and especially the novel "Rose Name" - Annaud had to choose the path to go. Due to all that, the film The Name of the Rose is primarily a crime movie located in the Middle Ages. All other models and levels that have a novel are either latently exaggerated or completely ignored.
This was my translation from Croatian to English from Ziher.hr article ''Ubojstvo u samostanu'' by. A.Bajrovic