IFF Film Review: "Rome, Open City" ("Roma città aperta") (1945).

"Rossellini's Great Film of Our Time." This is Rome, Open City (Roma città aperta). This Italian neorealist war drama film directed by Roberto Rossellini and written by Rossellini, Sergio Amidei and Federico Fellini. It is the first film in Rosselini's "Neorealist Trilogy", followed by Paisan (1946) and Germany, Year Zero (1948). Resistance leader Luigi Ferrari is pursued by Major Fritz Bergmann, a German intelligence officer who wants the name of others in the underground movement. Ferrari enlists the help of sympathetic priest Don Pietro Pellegrini to pass on funds to the fighters in case he is captured, but is accidentally betrayed by a former lover. 

Towards the end of World War II, Rossellini had initially planned a documentary titled Storie di ierion the subject of Don Pieto Morosini, a Catholic priest who had been shot by the Nazis for helping the partisan movement in Italy, and began meeting with a number of screenwriters in Rome shortly after Germany abandoned the city. Rossellini, Fellini and Amidei began working on the script during the German occupation of Italy. However, Fellini in his memoirs claims that Rossellini invited him to "participate in writing the script for the film, which later became known as 'Rome - an open city'" after Rome was occupied by the Americans. Fellini was initially uninterested in joining, as he had disapproved of partisan action during the occupation. On June 4, 1944, the Nazis abandoned Rome; the Allies occupied the undefended city the next day. By late January 1945, Aldo Fabrizi, Anna Magnani, Marcello Pagliero, Vito Annicchiarico, Nando Bruno, Harry Feist, Giovanna Galletti, Francesco Grandjacquet and Maria Michi were cast. In order to authentically portray the hardships and poverty of life in Rome under the occupation Rossellini hired mostly non-professional actors. Rossellini also used real German POWs as extras for added realistic effect. At the same time, principal photography commenced and wrapped in late June 1945. Filming took place under precarious conditions, with its style developing from circumstance, throughout the titular city. The facilities at Cinecittà Studios were unavailable at the time, as they had been damaged in the war and were then currently requisitioned by Allied forces to house displaced persons. The film was shot by using different kinds of available stock that were pieced together.These included the Leica stock that was being used by Italian cameramen to take home movies of American soldiers touring the sites of Rome, and the high quality Kodak stock used to make newsreel shorts of the time. Aldo Venturini, a wool merchant with some capital to invest, was involved in financing the film. After a few days of shooting, production had stopped due to lack of cash, and Rossellini convinced Aldo Venturini, a wool merchant with some capital to invest, to complete the film as a producer, arguing that it was the only way to safeguard his investment.

The performances were chillingly blunt, doggedly unsentimental and emotionally overwhelming.

The film effectively maintains the rough-hewn, in-the-streets feel of neorealism, and in its best moments it feels like something captured, rather than something produced.

Simon says Rome, Open City (Roma città aperta) receives:

Also, see my IFF review for Journey to Italy (Viaggio in Italia).