Italian Neorealism also known as the Golden Age Of Italian Cinema, after the Second World War and the fall of Mussolini's government film making within Italy lost its epicentre. The solution was to create a new type of film that focused on the repercussions of the war. The poverty stricken, the poor and the disadvantages became subjects for the films created that wanted to send a social message. Neorealism became the symbol of cultural change and social progress.
Roberto Rossellini
An Italian film director and screenwriter he is one of the influential directors of the neorealism period. During fascist Italy while Mussolini was in power Rossellini created the "Fascist Trilogy" between 1941 and 1943 with the films being sponsored by the propaganda centres within the government. With the collapse of the fascist regime in 1943 snd with the liberation of rome, Rossellini began to write and produce Roma Cittá aperta (1945) (Rome, open city). This was the start of the Neorealistic Trilogy, Paisá (1946) and Germany, Year Zero (1948) make up the later two films. The funding from these films came from small loans and the films were originally sold on the black market in Italy, due to the anti-fascim stance of the films they appealed to the disadvantaged of society. Rossellini used non-actors in his films but often struggled to find someone who's face he deemed interesting enough for his films. As he declared in an interview, "in order to really create the character that one has in mind, it is necessary for the director to engage in a battle with his actor which usually ends with submitting to the actor's wish. Since I do not have the desire to waste my energy in a battle like this, I only use professional actors occasionally".
Tom Dewe Mathews on Roberto Rossellini: gambler, sexual adventurer and master film-maker
"But the "man who knows nothing," as West put it, is also acknowledged as the father of Italian neo-realism, the director who introduced naturalism into world cinema in 1946 with his revolutionary film, Rome, Open City. Then, three years later, Rossellini again tried to change the way we look at films. This time - largely in his films made with Ingrid Bergman, such as Stromboli or Journey to Italy - his aim was to encourage the audience to understand and engage with his actors through an exploration with them of their surroundings on screen. This was in opposition to the more conventional Hollywood method of identifying with the characters on the screen. With Rossellini's way, he claimed, one watches "with one's own eyes".
This interlude, however, replenished him. "Few film-makers at this stage of their lives or careers were as adventurous or ambitious," notes Scorsese in the preface to a new book, Roberto Rossellini: Magician of the Real. Scorsese adds, "Rossellini's goal was nothing less than to educate the entire world." The method he chose was TV, which he regarded as an overlooked "educational tool" for mass audiences and the means he applied was biopics or "film histories" of cultural heroes from Socrates, Christ and St Augustine through to Pascal, Alberti and Karl Marx, in a proposed film that was cut short by Rossellini's death from a heart attack in 1977.
With Rossellini, however, there was always a distinctive method underlying any apparent madness. The same year he made Journey to Italy, Rossellini attacked the idea of pre-planned scripts in the style of Hitchcock. That was all right in Hollywood where films were made "purely for entertainment". For "realistic" films, he insisted, inspiration and spontaneity were what mattered. "An author writes a sentence or page, then crosses it out. A painter uses a red, then paints it out with a green. Why shouldn't I be able to cross things out too, to remake and replace film? This is why I don't think you can have a fixed script. If I thought you could, I'd think of myself as a scriptwriter. But I'm not a scriptwriter. I make films."
Rossellini Films:
An Italian film director and screenwriter he is one of the influential directors of the neorealism period. During fascist Italy while Mussolini was in power Rossellini created the "Fascist Trilogy" between 1941 and 1943 with the films being sponsored by the propaganda centres within the government. With the collapse of the fascist regime in 1943 snd with the liberation of rome, Rossellini began to write and produce Roma Cittá aperta (1945) (Rome, open city). This was the start of the Neorealistic Trilogy, Paisá (1946) and Germany, Year Zero (1948) make up the later two films. The funding from these films came from small loans and the films were originally sold on the black market in Italy, due to the anti-fascim stance of the films they appealed to the disadvantaged of society. Rossellini used non-actors in his films but often struggled to find someone who's face he deemed interesting enough for his films. As he declared in an interview, "in order to really create the character that one has in mind, it is necessary for the director to engage in a battle with his actor which usually ends with submitting to the actor's wish. Since I do not have the desire to waste my energy in a battle like this, I only use professional actors occasionally".
Tom Dewe Mathews on Roberto Rossellini: gambler, sexual adventurer and master film-maker
"But the "man who knows nothing," as West put it, is also acknowledged as the father of Italian neo-realism, the director who introduced naturalism into world cinema in 1946 with his revolutionary film, Rome, Open City. Then, three years later, Rossellini again tried to change the way we look at films. This time - largely in his films made with Ingrid Bergman, such as Stromboli or Journey to Italy - his aim was to encourage the audience to understand and engage with his actors through an exploration with them of their surroundings on screen. This was in opposition to the more conventional Hollywood method of identifying with the characters on the screen. With Rossellini's way, he claimed, one watches "with one's own eyes".
This interlude, however, replenished him. "Few film-makers at this stage of their lives or careers were as adventurous or ambitious," notes Scorsese in the preface to a new book, Roberto Rossellini: Magician of the Real. Scorsese adds, "Rossellini's goal was nothing less than to educate the entire world." The method he chose was TV, which he regarded as an overlooked "educational tool" for mass audiences and the means he applied was biopics or "film histories" of cultural heroes from Socrates, Christ and St Augustine through to Pascal, Alberti and Karl Marx, in a proposed film that was cut short by Rossellini's death from a heart attack in 1977.
With Rossellini, however, there was always a distinctive method underlying any apparent madness. The same year he made Journey to Italy, Rossellini attacked the idea of pre-planned scripts in the style of Hitchcock. That was all right in Hollywood where films were made "purely for entertainment". For "realistic" films, he insisted, inspiration and spontaneity were what mattered. "An author writes a sentence or page, then crosses it out. A painter uses a red, then paints it out with a green. Why shouldn't I be able to cross things out too, to remake and replace film? This is why I don't think you can have a fixed script. If I thought you could, I'd think of myself as a scriptwriter. But I'm not a scriptwriter. I make films."
Rossellini Films:
Context of Italy's social situation:
Extracts from A history of contemporary Italy; society and politics 1943-1988 by Paul Ginsborg
Roberto Rossellini and his Italian Cinema: The Search for Realism
Toward the end of the second World War, when the air raid sirens ceased to scream and enemy bombs ceased to fall, Italy awoke to find itself enveloped in crime and social unrest. Seizing the energy of a free society, one without the repressive controls of a dictator, film makers set out to record and document the rebirth of Italian society. The morose reality was recorded by the cameras of visionary film makers who found enough inspiration within their dismal atmosphere to create a new stylistic approach to film making: Neorealism.
Toward the end of the second World War, when the air raid sirens ceased to scream and enemy bombs ceased to fall, Italy awoke to find itself enveloped in crime and social unrest. Seizing the energy of a free society, one without the repressive controls of a dictator, film makers set out to record and document the rebirth of Italian society. The morose reality was recorded by the cameras of visionary film makers who found enough inspiration within their dismal atmosphere to create a new stylistic approach to film making: Neorealism.
Quite often, Italian Neorealism is considered a phenomenon which exploded onto the cinema scene when the Fascist regime fell, giving Italian film makers the artistic freedoms which were denied to them for over 20 years. It is commonly regarded as a smooth break from the repressive Fascist era. Neorealism's prescription for cinematic realism, set forth by film scholars and critics, called for the use of non-professional actors, regional dialects, current subject matter, authentic locations, documentary aspects, and the use of the film as a social statement. In 1945, Roberto Rossellini was hailed "The Father of Neorealism" with his first international success "Rome, Open City" which was consistent with the neorealist prescription. His next two movies, "Paisan" and "Germany, Year Zero" likewise did the same. However, the similarities between Rossellini's realism and that defined by the mainstream end here.
First, Rossellini's interest in the portrayal of realism was deeply rooted within the Fascist cinematic era in which he was trained by truly Fascist film makers and government officials. Apparently there was not a smooth break between the Fascist and the Neorealist eras. Second, he vehemently rebelled against critics, scholars, political figures and other film makers who tried to set and force others to follow guidelines as to what elements were necessary to portray reality. The tension between these two sides, which ran particularly height in post-war period to the early 1950's, caused Rossellini's popularity with the mainstream audience and critics to plummet substantially. One writer even wrote, "To change one's profession in certain circumstances is, without doubt, the wisest thing one can do," suggesting that Rossellini get out of the film business (Films 98). Even though, with each consecutive film, the ticket sales steadily decreased.
Rossellini continued to forge ahead in the development of his own personal portrayal of truth and realism, a movement which, though contrary to that of the mainstream, was important in shaping post-war cinema. Therefore, in order to show how his personal conception of truth and reality evolved within these high-tension years, it is essential to look at the evolution of these realistic aspects within his films from 1941 to 1953, apart from the interference of mainstream recommendations and criticisms.
The Neorealist Trilogy (1945 - 1947)
With the war finally over and Mussolini’s repressive measures gone, Rossellini was given a type of freedom which he had never had before. After living under Fascist rule for over 20 years and silently abiding by the rhetoric, Rossellini broke free from this ideological conformation to take a moral stand. Two months following the liberation of Rome, he started to film one of his biggest successes, Roma citta’ aperta . Lacking a producer, Rossellini sold his furniture, took out loans, and, with the help of his friends, scraped together seven or eight million lire (Aprà 50). To cut down on production costs, he used post-synchronization of the sound as it was several hundred lira cheaper to develop silent film. In the box offices around the world Roma citta’ aperta was a big hit which signaled to film critics and scholars that a film revolution was beginning.
His next film Pasiá took one step further toward a revolutionary style of film making. He would place his cameraman in the middle of the main square in a rural town and choose his actors from the inquisitive faces who came to investigate. Rossellini, excited by the promise of his American producer, Rod Geiger, to bring along famous American actors like Lana Turner and Gregory Peck to interpret his script, was disappointed when he was presented with a group of unknown theater actors (Films 68). Since the main theme of this film is interaction between two foreign cultures, Rossellini first observed a personal chemistry between the actors in each episode. He finalized the script only after the actors of the episodes met with their foreign counterpart and developed a rapport.
After the tragic death of his son, Marco Romano in 1946, Rossellini's next film Germania anno zero was filled with pain, violence and pessimism. It resulted in an attempt to discover, through death, the reason for living (Rondolino 62) . It was financed by a French production house and filmed in that country's Berlin sector. Like his previous film, Rossellini first tried to find his actors in the streets of Berlin. He placed his camera man in the center of a town square as he did for a previous film but was surprised when nobody came to watch.
The people's search for food took precedence over the follies of film making. Finally, he found Edmund in a local circus, where his parents performed as stunt horse riders (Aprà 61). Edmund's father, who, interestingly enough, had been a silent film actor in previous years, was discovered in a public hospital. Ironically, Edmund's sworn Nazi brother came from a dignified university family and had been kept a prisoner of the Gestapo during the war. Finally, Edmund's sister was discovered as she was waiting in a bread line. A former ballerina, Rossellini was drawn to her by the desperation in her face.
The Cinema Under Mussolini
Films made during the Fascist period, 1922 to 1943 virtually had been pushed aside and written off as meaningless propaganda. However, thanks to the Fascist regime, there is a lot of value and artistic expression to be found within these classics. Mussolini’s dictatorship was an authoritarian style of governing as opposed to Hitler and Stalin’s totalitarian style. In Russia and Germany, the government sought to control not only the public behavior of their people but also their private thoughts and opinions within their homes. For example, a German under Hitler’s rule could not even utter a word against the Führer in the company of his own family for fear that they would report him to the government and be arrested for his opposition. Meanwhile in Italy, Mussolini sought only to control people’s outward behavior to crush any opposition they may have toward the government while giving them a little more room to develop their personal thoughts and opinions. With this style of governing, Mussolini did not deport its intellectuals as Germany did. The government was more tolerant toward them as long as they did not use their opinions to incite the public. These differences between Italy, Germany and Russia also held true in the cinema industry.
Both Russia and Germany worked diligently to consolidate political interests and the cinema into one giant vehicle for propaganda. According to Stalin, 'Film is the strongest art,' and Russian film makers churned out hundreds upon hundreds of blatantly propagandist movies on the greatness of the Russian state and its leaders. Likewise, in Germany, Hitler used films to brainwash people as to the inferiority of certain races as well as embellishing on his right to power. Compared to Stalin and Hitler's film industries, Italian political and cinema groups never were able to work together in perfect unison. Luigi Freddi, who was in charge of Italian cultural control, never united Italy’s political vein with those of the cinema industry and, as a result, its films never achieved the marked propagandist content like those of Russia and Germany. True Fascist propaganda was to be found in “black” films, which championed the Fascist ideology and cause. They often were short newsreels shown in movie theaters before the main film, rather than full length feature films. On the other end of the spectrum, film makers produced "white telephone" films which were made up of melodramatic romances and light-hearted comedies. The majority of the films made under the Fascist era were in fact Fascist films, war-based films with a fictional story line and a heavy dose of propaganda, but usually could be found toward the middle of the Black-White spectrum.
In order to organize the film industry, the Fascist government experimented with political organizations and censor boards. LUCE ( L’Unione Cinematografica Educativa , 1925- 1929) oversaw all cinematic operations in Italy. It’s main goal was to promote the making of educational films and documentaries in order to raise an awareness of the link between film and politics. This organization was concerned mainly with newsreels and not with the commercial film industry (Brunetta 33).
In 1933, the government passed laws to preserve the integrity of Italian films abroad. According to these regulations, Italian films could not be dubbed into foreign languages. In addition, it was obligatory for all foreign films to be dubbed into Italian, the cost of which was covered by the foreign production houses. This tax, collected by the government, was later re-invested into the Italian cinematic endeavors.
In 1934, Luigi Freddi headed the Direzione Generale per la Cinema which was a state funded and controlled censor board made up of Fascists and War Minister officials. Their responsibility was to read and modify scripts, award prizes to film makers who championed the Fascist cause, and monitor the importation of foreign films (Brunetta 45). Quite a number of American films were banned because they could have influenced the Italian population in a negative way. The main goal of this censor board was not to ban Italian films that did not agree with Fascist ideology, but rather to modify them so that they didn’t contradict the government or incite the population to rise up against the government. Any script with pro-Fascist messages originally written in by the screen writer could receive up to 100% funding by the state controlled film section of the Banco di Lavoro . The Direzione could also recommend approved scripts to receive a 60% advance of capital, a hefty sum to come by in a time of war.
In 1935, ENIC or Ente Nazionale Industrie Cinematografiche completed the Fascist infiltration of every aspect of the cinematic realm by buying up a movie theater chain. In 1938, the ENIC expanded to regulate the number of foreign films entering the country. It was the only channel in whereby foreign films could be imported, severely limiting the selection of popular American films which could be sold to distributors. Also in this year, Mussolini set up the Centro sperimentale di cinematografia , a professional film school which still functions today. More importantly, Mussolini opened up Italy’s first film studio, Cinecitta in 1937, to help film makers produce movies with Fascist messages. The day of its grand opening, April 21st, was significant in that it was the day believed to be the founding of ancient Rome, thereby drawing a link between the greatness of ancient Rome and that of Italian Cinema. Mussolini named himself the principal orchestrator in Italian Cinema by placing a picture of himself behind a film camera with a spinoff of Lenin's quote , “Film is the most powerful weapon” at the Cinecitta' studios (Films 5).
One aspect of film making that everybody, no matter what their position on the political spectrum, called for was more realism in Italian films . The cinema was following the literary movement's general trend toward realism. Political leaders also encouraged a more realistic cinematic language. Scenes shot in authentic locations, such as one of Italy’s most famous monuments, or documentary aspects fused together with that of fiction would make a film more believable and would surely receive a higher star rating than those produced indoor on constructed sets. Those on the Right, including Vittorio Mussolini, seized this idea for its double effect. Not only would audiences enjoy more authentic films, but the showing of Italian monuments, culture and subject matter would bolster pride and love for their country and raise popular support for the nationalistic actions of the Fascist government, especially during the early stages of World War II.
Rossellini's Neorealist Trilogy: The Neorealist Prescription
Freed from the ties of the Fascist perception of film making, Roberto Rossellini rose up out of the war destruction to photograph reality. Though he ran fast and far away from the Fascist war rhetoric, each of his Neorealistic films still addresses the theme of a country in war. This time, though, it was the war of liberation and of the partisan resistance. Interestingly enough, Rossellini's post-war films were not all that different from those of the Fascist era in that he used a similar prescription for portraying reality, hence, he had not made a clean break with the Fascist era in which he received his film training. Rather, he modified the Fascist recommendations of reality to complete a trilogy on the effects of the partisan struggle and the problems of liberation for Italian citizens.
The first realistic aspect of his Neorealist films, which he carried over from his Fascist era training, is that of using actual footage of the war and liberation to give each film documentary aspects and a newsreel feel. This functioned, as it had in the past, to give the films a greater authenticity and believability. Out of this trilogy the best example is in Paisá which is organized in episodes that follow the chronological events of the liberation by Allied troops. A voice- over introduces each episode giving necessary information including the dates and locations of the events to follow. As the voice explains the events, actual liberation footage is being shown. Even a map is displayed in order to trace the Allied progress and chart their successes. The voice-over is objective and announces only the facts without any hint of emotion. These introductions are merged so well with actual footage of the places and events described that it is difficult to distinguish which sections were war footage and which was scripted footage.
The second aspect that Rossellini extended from his earlier career was that of the use of non- professional actors. In a 1946 interview with the French magazine 'L'Ecran Française ' Rossellini gave his opinion on the use of professional actors: 'In order to really create the character that one has in mind, it is necessary for the director to engage in a battle his actor which usually ends with submitting to the actor's wish. Since I do not have the desire to waste my energy in a battle like this, I only use professional actors occasionally' (Aprà 51). Whatever his reasons, the lack of professional actors certainly created a stunning artistic effect especially in Paisáand Germania anno zero . Not only were these first-time actors used only in shooting the film but also in the script writing process. Ex-partisans and those who lived during this period were interviewed at length by Rossellini, who then re-worked the script in order to add their first hand accounts. In addition, Rossellini exploited the local color of these interpreters by employing their regional accent, dialect, and costumes.
In order to pursue the portrayal of reality even further, Rossellini began to occupy himself with portraying an unbiased perspective which would allow the viewers to judge the various ideologies for themselves. He attempted to do this in two ways, each of which is evident in Roma cittá aperta . First, in this film, Rossellini included at least one character to embody each different cause or ideology. Manfredi champions the Communist cause, Don Pietro represents the Catholic faith, and Major Bergmann embodies the Nazi ideology. These characters represent the main ideologies and causes while the other protagonists exemplify the common people who occupied themselves more with every day survival. This method of allowing all of the different political factions to voice their unadulterated views, allowed the audience to examine each platform without the interference of the director's own perspective. Therefore, the viewer was not force-fed any political preference and was urged to form their own opinions and preferences.
Rossellini also demonstrated the tension between the different factions as well as how they put aside their differences to unify against the common enemy, the Nazis (Films 52). He concentrated on a diluted version of the ideological and political tension between the Communist partisans and the Catholic partisans. First, Manfredi, a Communist, expresses his disapproval with Pina's decision to have a religious wedding in a Catholic church. However, he changes his mind when Pina responds that it is better to have a Catholic church wedding than a secular one by a Fascist official. This relatively modest example introduces the political tension between the Catholics and the Communists, the idea which Rossellini expounds upon in the final scenes where Major Bergmann's manipulates their ideological differences by threatening death if one did not betray the followers of the other.
By letting each group present their platform and by demonstrating the actual political tension between these partisan factions, Rossellini was careful to present an objective account that would realistically represent the events in Rome at the time. This effort could be viewed as a backlash against the strong messages of propaganda that Rossellini was forced to use in his previous films. He retreated from the Fascist extreme of forcing opinions to the objective extreme of trying to represent aspects of all beliefs. However, in the latter, an hour and a half film did not provide enough time to present the intricacies of each platform. It was just to much material to attack in a short film such as Roma citta' aperta . In an bid to compromise between these two extremes, Rossellini concluded his Neorealist Trilogy and began to look at other, more moderate methods of portraying reality.
No comments:
Post a Comment