Italian choices: Marcello & Jacques, Anna & Giulietta

CRONACA FAMILIARE (FAMILY DIARY), 1962. Finally, a look at Valerio Zurlini’s absorbing family drama with brilliant performances from Marcello Mastroianni and Jacques Perrin. Post-war Italy looks marvellous, as lensed by Giussepe Rottuno, and produced by Geoffredo Lombardo. Sylvie scores too as the grand-mother. It is all as marvellous as De Sica’s GARDEN OF THE FINZI-CONTINI (Italian label). Zurlini’s film is a melancholy meditation on two very different brothers, poor tubucular writer Enrico (Mastroianni) and the also ailing Lorenzo – Perrin is as effective here as he was in Zurlini’s GIRL WITH A SUITCASE or Bolognini’s LA CORRUZIONE, and of course this was Mastroianni’s great era too.. 

The downbeat story is totally affecting and leaves one in an emotional state. Did I say it looks marvellous? Its a perfectly restored print.

HELL IN THE CITY, 1959  (aka CAGED, Nella Citta L’Inferno) . Marvellous widescreen black and white drama with lots of comic moments from Renato Castellani and scipted by veteran Suso Cecchi D'Amico, which is a showcase for two of Italy’s greatest actresses Anna Magnani and Giulietta Masina. We are in a Roman prison, run by nuns. Masina is Lina, the timid newcomer, a variation on Masina’s CABIRIA – Lina is another lovelorn waif, seemingly a bit simple, who has been sent to prison for unknowingly aiding a robbery – a maid for a rich family, she was fooled by a man (Alberti Sordi doing a cameo) who got her to allow him into the house and then took her to the cinema while his accomplice carried out the robbery. Lina cries a lot and exasperates hardened criminal Egle – Magnani, forever in her black slip, as she dominates the screen. 

The other inmates are a varied bunch and we get involved in some stories. Renato Salvatori plays Piero, whom the nice young girl can see with the aid of a mirror, and there may be a happy ending for them. Lina finally leaves but will she be back? SPOILER AHEAD: Yes she does return and is now a hardened criminal, Egle is horrified to see how she has changed as Lina thanks her for teaching her the tricks of the trade. It is a satisfying conclusion and the two leads play it to the hilt. 

Antonioni, Fellini and Visconti as well as De Sica and Rossellini may have been the Italian great directors (along with Pasolini & Bertolucci and more), but its been fascinating catching up with those early films by Mauro Bolognini (1922-2001),which we like a lot here - LA NOTTE BRAVA, GIOVANI MARITI, CORRUPTION, SENILITA, METELLO, GRAN BOLLITO etc (as reviewed at Italian label). I still have to see Mastroianni & Cardinale in his highly-regarded IL BELL'ANTONIO, 1960, and Belmondo and Cardinale in LA VIACCIA, 1961., 

Another one, not available now, is his equally fascinating sounding FROM A ROMAN BALCONY (LA GIORNATA BALORDA), 1960, from a Moravia novel, with those attractive players Jean Sorel and Lea Massari. The trailer for it is on YouTube though:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10i0K8iAT40

Bolognini also did episodes in those Italian compendium films I like: LE BAMBOLE (Four Kinds of Love - the hilarious and sexy Sorel & Lollobrigida episode) and LE FATA (The Queens), Sorel with Raquel Welch. 

Next Italian: Marcello and Romy in FANTASMA D'AMORE, 1981 - finally, a sub-titled print, and the Blu-ray of THE GREAT BEAUTY.  

"She lives the life".

Italian week: 2 - Early Fellini

"Welcome to a bittersweet world of episodic adventures and strange encounters. Welcome to a sordid, nocturnal world of ruthless, callous boyfriends and stray movie stars looking for seedy kicks. Welcome to the harsh, unforgiving streets of a crumbling Rome, where hope can still prevail and dreams cradle the lost. Welcome to the world of Cabiria, a feisty, loud, outspoken and somewhat naive prostitute waiting for a miracle, and one of the most unforgettable and endearing characters of European cinema.

Eventually remade in Hollywood as SWEET CHARITY, NIGHTS OF CABIRIA is an often humorous, poignant, unflinching and vivid portrayal of one woman's picaresque existence and her perseverence through adversity. Starring Fellini's wife Giulietta Masina as the irrepressible protagonist, NIGHTS OF CABIRIA marked Fellini's last foray into gritty neo-realism before venturing into the surreal satire and dream logic of LA DOLCE VITA and EIGHT AND A HALF".

Thus that boxset of early Fellini movies describes NIGHTS OF CABIRIA. When I was 12 my "Picture Show" Annual for 1959 (which I still have) had a photograph (right) from it among the previous year's Oscar winners - and its taken me all this time to see it! I absolutely loved I VITELLONI (Italian label) when I saw it last year - its one of the great coming of age movies and it applies to life in any small town, I saw my own Irish one in it vividly - more mixed feelings though about CABIRIA - we are back in that Fellini world of happy go lucky prostitutes and their pimps who all seem a friendly gang looking out for each other, with visits to the country, and to the music hall. At the start someone asks who Cabiria (who has just been fished out of the river) is and what does she do. "She lives the life" a young lad answers.

"She works hard for the money" as Cabirina has her own (jerry built?) house and no pimp looking after her - its just her boyfriends who rob her blind as she naively trusts them time and time again. At the start one of them pushes her into the river and grabs her handbag - but at the climax (after selling her house and getting all her savings together) she has lost everything but still manages that smile .... we do not actually see her "working" apart from when the movie star picks her up, there is a lovely sequence of her dancing and Masina is indeed of course a great clown - and that disturbing sequence when she gets caught up in a religious pilgrimage at a local shrine where she seeks the Madonna's intercession to change her life and be loved for herself .

But of course now one keeps seeing Shirley McLaine as Charity Hope Valentine singing "If My Friends Could See Me Now" or making a meal of that climax in Central Park. Masina keeps it more real as she turns up to meet her latest man - Francois Perrier (who also ruined GERVAISE - French label) - who suddenly looks very shifty in those sun-glasses .... CABIRIA could be seen as a bleak, often depressing film as Cabiria seems too naive and so desperate for affection, she is almost simple-minded with her bundle of money for her latest beau - will she now end up living in a hole too? - like that older prostitute she recognised in that strange sequence with "the man in the sack" feeding the poor who live in underground caves ... one wants a happy ending for her. It is one of the great endings though, and the whole film captures that post-war Italy (like in Pasolini's grimmer ACCATONE or MAMMA ROMA with Magnani) before the LA DOLCE VITA highlife took over...

Masina made her first appearance as Cabiria in THE WHITE SHEIK in 1952 which I imagine I will like a lot, it will be my next Fellini (shortly) along with, finally, LA STRADA. I also recently got EIGHT AND HALF as a gift (thanks Jerry)  which I had not seen since the '60s, - and of course I loved AMARCORD and ROMA - perhaps Federico's most accessible films, and also have SATYRICON - how we rushed to that in 1970. I have not seen Masina's other great role JULIET OF THE SPIRITS since the '60s also, and liked Fellini's CASANOVA a lot too in 1976. So there are some other late Fellini's (like GINGER AND FRED, AND THE BOAT SAILED ON to catch up with too then ....  some Antonioni rarities next though. Of those Italian titans it has always been Antonioni I gravitated towards most but Fellini and Visconti make up that great triumvirate who came to prominance after Rossellini and De Sica.

I had another view of Masina too today in HELL IS THE CITY (Nella Città l'inferno by Castellani) or CAGED, made in 1959, a great scene where she is leaving prison and Anna Magnani is still locked up - its a stunning sequence on YouTube at:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIxe24WnsqU