Starring: Anna Magnani, Nando Bruno, Ave Ninchi, Maria Grazia Francia
Label: Dolmen Home Video (2008)
Format: DVD / PAL / Region 2
Aspect ratio: 1.33:1 b/w
Audio: Italian (Dolby Digital 1.0 mono/5.1 remix)
Subtitles: English, Italian
Bonus:
Available on Amazon.it
What's the film about?
Trying to obtain better condition for her poor family, stormy housewife inadvertently starts a political movement... Before Open City Anna Magnani was better known as folk singer and vaudeville comedian, and in fact after Rossellini's film she made a handful of immensely successful dialect comedies. Here, director Luigi Zampa managed to inject her screen persona into a populist satire, thus anticipating the social issues addressed in later Italian comedies.
Recommendations
...if you are eager to see what Magnani is able to do in a Capra-esque picture.
...if you are eager to see what Magnani is able to do in a Capra-esque picture.
Screenshots
This is a good film though not as good as other Italian films from the period and not as good as it could have been. The story was interesting but sometimes cliched and predictable. The English subtitles on the DVD were very incomplete - many lines of dialogue were untranslated.
ReplyDeleteYes, the DVD features old-style subtitles, so you only get a summary of what the characters are talking about, not a translation line by line. Still, I think this is an interesting film, especially for anyone interested in post-Neorealism and early comedy Italia style.
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