The experience of defeat and occupation with the daily humiliations, was happily not one that the Americans or British had to undergo... But for those countries which did suffer under the frame of foreign oppressionFrance, Italy, Czechoslovakia and Polandthe experience left a heritage of bitterness deeply evident in their films...
Italy, however, was a special and unusual case: it was occupied by two opposing armiesthe German and the American at the same time... And as neither side trusted the Italians they were left to get on with their own internal political quarrels of partisans versus fascist, within the limits, of course, of occupation...
It was these experiences that Roberto Rossellini recorded in his trilogy about war 'Rome, Open City', 'Paisá,' and 'Germany Year Zero.'
Rossellini called 'Rome, Open City' a film about 'fear, everyone's fear, but above all my own.'
Made under difficult a penurious circumstances towards the war's end, the film captures with an astonishing consciousness the whole experience... There is no need to recreate anything for it is all there, in the ruined buildings and in the people's faces... Rossellini had 'planted the camera in the middle of real life' and so spearheaded the Neo-realist film revival...
But Rossellini did more than just film things as they were... His creative genius molded what existed into a film of overpowering impact, an impact which does not recede with the passing of years... Out of his own particular situation he has created a magnificent story of resistance both concrete and spiritual which could not be broken by force... And in fact, it is only broken by the promise of luxury: Marina betrays her lover because she has been caught up in the decadence of the oppressor's world... But Manfredi when caught does not crack under the brutal torture...
Rossellini endows all those who resist, whether Communist or Catholic, with a special kind of purity... Manfredi, Francesco, Pina (played by the magnificent Anna Magnani), and the children all seem to have drunk of the same deep and clear well of faith... We see this especially in the priest, Don Pietro (Aldo Fabrizi), a kind man, wedded to a faith which obviously based on a true Christian humility... His humble activities as resistance worker only underline what he is already... 'It is my duty to help those who need it,' he answers when asked why he is taking such great risks... And when he is captured and tortured by the Gestapo he accepts his fate: 'It is not difficult to die well. It is difficult to live well.'
Italy, however, was a special and unusual case: it was occupied by two opposing armiesthe German and the American at the same time... And as neither side trusted the Italians they were left to get on with their own internal political quarrels of partisans versus fascist, within the limits, of course, of occupation...
It was these experiences that Roberto Rossellini recorded in his trilogy about war 'Rome, Open City', 'Paisá,' and 'Germany Year Zero.'
Rossellini called 'Rome, Open City' a film about 'fear, everyone's fear, but above all my own.'
Made under difficult a penurious circumstances towards the war's end, the film captures with an astonishing consciousness the whole experience... There is no need to recreate anything for it is all there, in the ruined buildings and in the people's faces... Rossellini had 'planted the camera in the middle of real life' and so spearheaded the Neo-realist film revival...
But Rossellini did more than just film things as they were... His creative genius molded what existed into a film of overpowering impact, an impact which does not recede with the passing of years... Out of his own particular situation he has created a magnificent story of resistance both concrete and spiritual which could not be broken by force... And in fact, it is only broken by the promise of luxury: Marina betrays her lover because she has been caught up in the decadence of the oppressor's world... But Manfredi when caught does not crack under the brutal torture...
Rossellini endows all those who resist, whether Communist or Catholic, with a special kind of purity... Manfredi, Francesco, Pina (played by the magnificent Anna Magnani), and the children all seem to have drunk of the same deep and clear well of faith... We see this especially in the priest, Don Pietro (Aldo Fabrizi), a kind man, wedded to a faith which obviously based on a true Christian humility... His humble activities as resistance worker only underline what he is already... 'It is my duty to help those who need it,' he answers when asked why he is taking such great risks... And when he is captured and tortured by the Gestapo he accepts his fate: 'It is not difficult to die well. It is difficult to live well.'