Italy on Page & Screen - Italy - page 1839

Cinema
Neorealist Grit
Out of the smouldering ruins of WWII emerged unflinching tales of woe, including
Roberto Rossellini's Roma, Città Aperta (Rome, Open City; 1945), a story of love, betrayal
and resistance in Nazi-occupied Rome. In Vittorio De Sica's Academy-awarded Ladri di
biciclette (The Bicycle Thieves; 1948), a doomed father attempts to provide for his son
without resorting to crime in war-ravaged Rome, while Pier Paolo Pasolini's Mamma Roma
(1962) revolves around an ageing prostitute trying to make an honest living for herself and
her deadbeat son.
Crime & Punishment
Italy's acclaimed new dramas combine the truthfulness of classic neorealism, the taut sus-
pense of Italian thrillers and the psychological revelations of Fellini. Among the best is
Matteo Garrone's brutal Camorra expose Gomorra (2008). Based on Roberto Saviano's
award-winning novel, the film won the Grand Prix at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.
Another Cannes success story is Paolo Sorrentino's Il divo (2008), which explores the life
of former prime minister Giulio Andreotti, from his migraines to his alleged Mafia ties.
Mafiosi are among the cast in the deeply poignant Cesare deve morire (Caesar Must Die;
2012), a documentary about maximum -security prisoners preparing to stage Shakespeare's
Julius Caesar . Directed by octogenarian brothers Paolo and Vittorio Taviani, the film
scooped the Golden Bear at the 2012 Berlin Film Festival.
Romance all'italiana
It's only natural that a nation of hopeless romantics should provide some of the world's
most tender celluloid moments. In Michael Radford's Il postino (The Postman; 1994), ex-
iled poet Pablo Neruda brings poetry and passion to a drowsy Italian isle and a misfit post-
man, played with heartbreaking subtlety by the late Massimo Troisi. Another classic is Gi-
useppe Tornatore's Oscar-winning Nuovo cinema paradiso (Cinema Paradiso; 1988) , a bit-
tersweet tale about a director who returns to Sicily and rediscovers his true loves: the girl
next door and the movies. In Silvio Sordini's Pane e tulipani (Bread and Tulips; 2000), a
housewife left behind at a tour-bus pit stop runs away to Venice, where she befriends an an-
archist florist, an eccentric masseuse and a suicidal Icelandic waiter - and gets pursued by