{"id":27908,"date":"2013-04-08T20:52:10","date_gmt":"2013-04-09T04:52:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=27908"},"modified":"2013-04-17T06:39:09","modified_gmt":"2013-04-17T14:39:09","slug":"rome-open-city-roberto-rossellini-1945-italy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=27908","title":{"rendered":"Rome Open City (Roberto Rossellini, 1945): Italy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy<\/a>.\u00a0 Viewed on DVD.<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0 During war time, a city may be declared open by the current government, in order to avoid further bombing and devastation.\u00a0 Rome Open City<\/em><\/a> takes place in Rome, at a pivotal time during WWII.\u00a0 With the Nazi Party and Italian Fascists still running the city, evidence of the\u00a0impending Americans and Allied Forces are clearly visible amongst debris of bombed out buildings.<\/p>\n

Pina (Anna Magnani) is pregnant, unwed, and mother to a young boy\u00a0named Marcello (Vito Annicchiarico), who secretly plants and ignites\u00a0bombs with other friends to aid the Italian Resistance.\u00a0 Francesco (Francesco Grandjacquet) is Pina’s fianc\u00e9, and a member of the\u00a0 Resistance, and although he’s not religious, Francesco has agreed to be married in The Church by Pina’s priest Don Pietro (Aldo Fabrizi), who also\u00a0happens to work underground with the Resistance.<\/p>\n

Giorgio (Marcello Pagliero) is\u00a0Francesco’s Communist friend,\u00a0and an important leader in the Resistance.\u00a0 He’s wanted by the Gestapo, and his lover Marina (Maria Michi), is an addict, who’s enticed by the Nazi’s to betray her\u00a0confidences for profit.<\/p>\n

In the midst of\u00a0rubble, poverty, hunger and hopelessness, the citizens rely on hope, generosity of others, and daily rations.\u00a0 Being allotted only 4 ounces a day, the local women and children storm a bakery, and come away with their bags full of panino, while an Italian sergeant,\u00a0hungry himself, looks the other way,\u00a0yet Pina generously shares a couple of loaves with him.<\/p>\n

While walking home with Don Pietro, Pina\u00a0admits she has led a “bad life,” and tells Don Pietro he could “never understand,” and while we the audience, are privy to Don Pietro’s underground work, Pina is not – Don Pietro replies “we have so much to be forgiven for.”<\/p>\n

Two years into the invasion with no end in sight,\u00a0Pina confides to Francesco\u00a0that sometimes she “just can’t go on.”\u00a0 Francesco comforts her, saying\u00a0“the road will be long and hard…but we’ll see a better world, and our children especially will see it, that’s why you mustn’t ever be afraid.”\u00a0 Hopelessly thinking of her young son, and the second child on the way, Pina replies “si, Francesco, [tears welling up in her eyes] but I’m never afraid.”<\/p>\n

Rome Open City <\/em>led to the dawning of a new film movement known as Italian Neorealism (or new realism), with themes that\u00a0surrounded realistic social issues of the lower working class, structured by post-war trauma, and based heavily on emotions with little\u00a0to no moral judgments made.\u00a0 This involved heavy use of on-location shooting, and lower grade film stock, which offered an immediacy to the look and\u00a0feel of the\u00a0film, and\u00a0was due in part to a lack of proper funding or available supplies.<\/p>\n

With a vague plot line and simplistic shooting style (or style-less), the subtle messages speak of the endurance of the next generation.\u00a0 The depth of the film may truly be found in what is said, rather than how much is said, while the focus is\u00a0placed on the subtle (or natural) acting style – a film lover cannot walk away from this film without falling in love with Anna Magnani’s low-key, heartfelt sincerity.<\/p>\n

Rome Open City<\/em> won several international awards, and was nominated for an Academy Award in Best Writing, and must be viewed twice to fully appreciate.<\/p>\n

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Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy.\u00a0 Viewed on DVD. \u00a0 During war time, a city may be declared open by the current government, in order to avoid further bombing and devastation.\u00a0 Rome Open City takes place in Rome, at a pivotal time during WWII.\u00a0 With the Nazi Party and Italian Fascists still running the city, evidence of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[187,67,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-criterion-collection","category-dvd","category-films"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}