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The Allies had barely driven the Nazis out of Rome when RobertoRosselini went to work on Open City, considered by most to be his greatest work.Shot on bits and short ends of scavenged film, this film helped define Italian neorealism.Audiences were convinced that the actors were all amateurs (they weren't) and the whole film was improvised (it wasn't; the three screenwriters included Federico Fellini).With its semidocumentary camera style and use of actual locations, the film does feel very real.Of course, so does the opening half-hour of Saving Private Ryan, and like that film Open City is at its heart a classic war yarn any Hollywood studio would feel at home with. The story involves members of the Italian underground trying to smuggle badly needed cash out of Nazi-occupied Rome to partisan fighters in the mountains, while the Nazis are hunting down one of the underground, a notorious freedom fighter and seditionist.Anna Magnani (an actor well established in her own country who became an international star with this film) is often singled out for her portrayal as the pregnant, unwed woman who gets caught up in the action on her wedding day, but the entire cast is topnotch.The sparse subtitles are both a blessing and a curse--there is less to read, which allows the viewer to concentrate on the visuals, but there are times when non-Italian-speakers will feel like they're missing out on some juicy dialogue. --Geof Miller ... Read more

Reviews (16)

In the smallest list of the greatest films of all time
Open City is generally considered to be in the top ten films of all time in terms of historical cinematic importance, stylistic achievement, and emotional power. It established the modern film, using available light, actual settings and a mix of theatrical and non-theatrical actors. Its musical score is breathtaking. It remains the first modern film, the first Italian neo-realist film, and possibly the most powerful film ever made. I have seen it three times in a theatre. Each time, virtually the entire audience was overwhelmed, sobbing uncontrolably at the end of the picture.

There has been so much written about this picture, I will only mention a few details. It was shot in Rome using captured German newsreal film as the Nazis left town. (Which is the reason the film quality bounces around as the differing film stocks were used.) When Ingrid Bergman saw the picture, she fell in love with the director she had never met, left her husband, flew to Italy, and married Rossellini.

There are too many great scenes to list. Let me just say that the near-final scene when the little priest damns the German officer and then apologizes to God is, for me, the single greatest moment in film.

Open City should be seen and owned by anyone interested in the movies.

Rossellini's Breakthrough
Italian film owes much to Roberto Rossellini. World film owes him more than he's worth, I'm afraid. Made under some of the most impoverished conditions an underground film ever had to face, Rome Open City has its moments of almost "documentary" realness. But then Rossellini had to tell a hopelessly melodramatic story of partisans betrayed by faithless women (most assuredly not Anna Magnani!) tortured by Nazis without betraying a single comrade, while an Italian priest watches over it all like Edmond O'Brien and invokes the wrath of God on the Germans. Far less "neo-realist" than propagandistic. Yet Rossellini got a career (and Ingrid Bergman) out of it.

Filmed in Anger
I watched Jean Renoir's Grand Illusion and Rossellini's Open City one day apart. Renoir's film about WWI prisoners of war was filled with nuance, ambiguity, and a sense of now muddy the waters are in life.

Rosselini's Open City rejected nuance and ambiguity; it was an angry film and understandibly so. Yet both Rosselini's film and Renoir's film attempt to reveal what is noble in humans.

Many criticisms can be made of Rosselini's film--other reviewers have made them--but it is a film that has an impact on the viewer. But the viewer should be reminded of one of Renoir's points: to what exent does the belief in black and white and the belief that good will eventually triumph serve as a grand--but false--illusion.

The viewer of Open City should keep in mind the real world political context of the film: the resistence movement in Italy was often led by communists. This was true in many other European countries during WWII. Rossellini's film certainly presented a communist leader as noble and heroic.

This was a real problem for the US forces which displaced the Germans. Domestic communists often had the most legitimacy of all groups who resisted the Germans. US policies in the immediate post-WWII period often attempted to undercut the political standing of the communists. Some have argued that the post-war Marshall plan for the reconstruction of Europe was based on the attempt to foster pro-business groups in Europe in order to undercut the social standing of communists.

I'm sure that the US post-war European authorities hated Open City because of OC's celebration of the role of communisits.

Five stars for the film - Four stars for the DVD
This is an awesomely powerful film - great movie! This is a must-see film for all movie fans worldwide. I loved the characters! They are so memorable - wonderful characters!
There are so many subtleties in this film, such as the "inverted" sexuality of the evil Nazi leaders, the cooperation of the Catholic clergy and the Communist rebels, the "good wife" vs her wanna-be starlet younger sister, the future of Italy expressed by the children at the end of the film, etc that it takes several viewings to absorb it all, but the ride is worth it.
The DVD is mastered at somewhat less than perfect standards however and the subtitling is part of the film and not overlaid and clearer in image unfortunately. There are no extras on the DVD, nor is there an audio-commentary track which would have been a wonderful addition! (Maybe next time).
Still, this is a brilliant film and I highly recommend it!!!

All roads lead to OPEN CITY ...
A few thoughts after reading these reviews...

OC is one of the top half-dozen films ever made. The attempt by Kino Video to make a version of this classic for the 'sweet-and-light' crowd by excluding (actually, they diminish) the blowtorch shot, is an abomination.

I'm glad this film is only $.... It is abridged in this edition. The Conoisseur Video print is, as others here have indicated, superior for that reason. Films like this go for about $... in these 'art house' editions. The viewer is, however, being cheated of the overall impact of the film by this Kino 'dollar-saver' edition.

You can regard a scene as brutal. However, trying to adapt a classic like OC for the 10-year-olds' market, or for effetely over-sensitive types is ridiculous. Would you take 'White-Out' to a Bosch painting ?

I consider this slashing of OC to be on the order of tampering with the classic scene in 'Citizen Kane' of Orson Welle's trashing the bedroom. It is regrettable.

For this reason, I am unlikely to procure a Kino Video copy of this film. I would be cheating my guests who I introduce this film to. I lament that I have waited so long to procure a copy. The more complete Conoisseur Video print is, as of this date, unavailable.(It features the Italian title footage,'ROMA: Citta Aperta' at the beginning, with an overhead shot of the city, by the way, for those who like to know such things...)

... and Kino has the gall to feature a snip of the blowtorch scene on the back package/cover, as though to imply it is included in their print! What a rip-off ... Rossellini would turn in his grave.

Kino deserves to be snubbed for the violence they have done to this print. It offends and irritates me deeply. They should be hissed off the stage. ... Read more

Description

Citizens fight for survival in the nightmarish devastation of post-World War II Berlin in this towering masterpiece of Italian neorealist cinema from groundbreaking director Robert Rossellini. Twelve-year-old Edmund, a child who has known only upheaval and terror, wanders from day to day trying to help his family and find money or food on the streets. One day he meets his former schoolteacher, who now profits from Nazi propaganda, and sets in motion a shocking new chain of violence. Filled with haunting imagery and unforgettable performances by real local citizens, this unflinching look at a country wracked with guilt and confusion will never leave your memory. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Post apocalyptic wasteland
Too bad has to be in Italian rather than the original German. Scenes of devastated Berlin are limited. European depiction of life at its basest, a decimated civilization trying to rebuild itself as the elements responsible for its downfall dominate. Not as harsh as might be expected.

A Major Neo-Realist Work in Need of Restoration.
GERMANIA ANNO ZERO is a film made in the Neo-Realist tradition by the Neo-Realist master Roberto Rossellini. It tells the simple but powerful story of Edmund - a boy trying to survive between the ruins of Berlin right after WWII. His family is as ruined as the city he lives in: his father is confined to a bed, his older brother fears prosecution for his Nazi past and his sister is a prostitute. Just like everybody else, Edmund manages to get some money from selling the things he finds here and there on the ruins; until one day he runs into his old school teacher: an old man who still preaches the Nazi ideology and defends the elimination of the weak. Influenced by those ideas, Edmund poisons his own father.

This is a powerful film that shows like no other the horrors of war (and the Nazi insanity) that inevitably destroy the lives of the ordinary inhabitants of the city. Rossellini, with his keen eye for detail (and his unique taste in composition), makes an impressive portrait of a chaotic city of empty ruins and basic survival.

GERMANIA ANNO ZERO is the third and final film in Rossellini's famous Neo-Realist war trilogy and is as strong and poignant as the others: OPEN CITY (ROMA CITTÀ APERTA) and PAISAN (PAISÀ).

...On the down side, this is a film that (like many european masterpieces) badly needs a restoration. There are print demages and the sound sounds like it was recorded a decade before. ... Read more

Reviews (8)

Rossellini's Best but So Far Most Obscure Film
West Coast Editor, Film Journal International

Enthusiasm has got the better hold of me. I cannot believe that this stark, formally brave, one-of-a-kind film directed by Roberto Rossellini, his next-to-last feature starring then-wife Ingrid Bergman, will find its way onto home video. Here, Rossellini insists on a completely inward performance from Bergman. The setting is deliberately theatrical, Bergman is seldom seen closely, and in fact much of the time what we see of her is a ghostly superimposition. There may never have been a less fleshly performance in the history of cinema, and yet Bergman's passion is tremendous, and she overcomes obstacles that would seem to prevent communication with us, as Joan fled imprisonment and the shackles of this world to unite with God. While I love the film versions of Joan of Arc directed by Carl Dreyer, Robert Bresson, and Jacques Rivette (the complete five-hour-plus version), this one is my favorite. If I were to select the ten best films ever made, this film, translated as "Joan at the Stake," would be one of them.

Rossellini's Joan of Arc
I haven't seen Rossellini's Joan of Arc but have wanted to very much--I think, however, that the other reviewers are referring not to this film but to Victor Fleming's 1948 version, also starring Ingrid Bergman. That is a more conventional, Hollywood production; Rossellini's is said to be a rather austere film of a stage production of Honegger's oratorio, made when Bergman was still Rossellini's wife.

I AM a teenager who loves classics, and this is MY FAVORITE!
I enjoy good movies by good actors. It is somewhat of a hobby. I was a little boy the last time I saw this movie, and I would do just about anything to see it again!!! Ingrid Bergeman made a SPECTACULAR performance in this EPIC ADVENTURE that people of all ages should see. If you are interested in the type of acting and performing that is superior to "modern Hollywood," then you need to see Ingrid at her best! I would put in a plea to the producers to re-release this film to a deserving audience!

It was fantastic. I recommend people of all ages to see it.
One night I looked in the TV guide and saw that Joan of arc was playing and I also saw the reviews on the television so I watched it. It really was marvelous and it taught me a lot about what her life was like. "Two thumbs up!"

Excellent: I remember the film from when I was a child.
This film was excellent and very inspirational. It is a story of a real teenager. It should be rereleased in video format. Today's teenagers should see it! ... Read more

Reviews (2)

a devastating, haunting neo-realist epic by Rossellini
Now that I have seen all three films in Roberto Rossellini's 'post-war' trilogy (the others being the groundbreaking Open City and Germany Year-Zero), I think Paisa is the one that got to me the most. I knew when I saw clips of the film in Scorsese's My Voyage to Italy that it would have some level of promise, but I didn't know it could be this compelling. Divided up into six vignettes, Rossellini paints something of a historical document as much as a film- each one carries its own strengths (there may be a weakness here and there for some, though this may lend itself to the fact that the film has not been restored and is in dire need of new subtitles), and the documentary-type approach elevates characters and situations to the level of great tragedy. These may be fictionalized accounts, they may not be, but in telling these stories, getting them through to the audience at the time, they remain potent little notes in film history.

From vignette to vignette, the allied forces move their way upward from Sicily to northern Italy. Among them, I got struck by how frank the issues were being dealt with, and how levels of humanity and kind-ness crept their way in. For example, the story with the drunken black man who spends some time with a kid dealing in the black-market, this is an emotionally complex scene- a viewer won't know how it'll turn out in the first few minutes, but it unfolds precisely to the characters' natures. The story involving the soldiers spending time in the monastery was also powerfully simplistic in the way it dealt with the themes of faith and sacrifice (the later stems to the other vignettes). And there are numerous other moments and scenes that can stop you dead in your tracks- a young child that cries in one scene and a nurse braving enemy territory had my mouth open.

I realize not that many people in my generation will seek out this film- notably since it's not easy to find except on-line- and certain scenes may seem too 'mushy' for some. However, there is worth to seeking out a work such as Paisa- in a sense, this and Rossellini's other early films were like the first independent films to Italy's claim. There isn't any sign in any of his post-war pictures that he's catering to studios or working on big budgets. These are stories being told with little money, non-professionals, and they definitely last years later after all the rubble was cleared. Maybe most remarkable is the way Rossellini and his writers (one of them Fellini) let things happen, and not without consequence or without logic of some sort. It's also a technically brilliant feature, with the cinematography by Otello Martelli creating shots as heart-rending as the performances. So, for those who hate dictated plots, sloppy clichés, and all the other disappointments found in 21st century movie-making & storytelling, this is a great place to dip your toes. If anything, it's surely thrilling as a war film.

Starkly Realistic
Made in the aftermath 0f WWII in black and white, this film follows the progress of the American army up the boot of Italy through five searing vignettes, which keep you on the edge of your seat with their intensity, yet provide genuinely funny moments. It is a roller-coaster of emotions. It made an indelible imprint on my heart. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

One of Bergman's best films
This film has been under-rated over the years! Forget the fact that Ingrid Bergman and director Roberto Rossellini had just fallen in love and that the scandal [the love affair and then their beautiful baby, Robertino]caused her to be exiled from the USA. The film would have been rated a masterpiece today, but was about twenty years ahead of its time.It's not meant to be a story, but an account of how one woman comes to terms with the life she has chosen, as a result of marrying an Italian from a refugee camp. Karin marries Antonio because she can't get a visa to Argentina. Then she discovers what his home is like: a rugged, black, volcanic island far to the north of Sicily. Their house is in a bad state of repair, to put it mildly. At first she rails against this situation, declaring proudly that she is "from a different class". Bergman acts out her part here brilliantly and almost makes us hate her - briefly. She then desperately tries to be accepted and to make the house a home, but is thwarted by the islanders. The women say she is "not modest" and, when she asks the local loose woman to help her sew a skirt, she's really in trouble. Her husband beats her. She then tries another tack: she attempts to use seductive tactics on the local priest and then on the lighthouse keeper. Again, her acting is brilliant and throughout it all she looks stunningly beautiful. One can only conclude that this was because she was actually in love with the man who was filming her- Roberto Rossellini.
Determined to escape, she climbs the volcano, but realises her attempt to get to Ginostra, on the other side, is hopeless. That final scene is so powerful, I cannot describe it. Everyone should see this film. Who needs modern cinema, when you can have this?
Ingrid Bergman stated that she was going to retire from acting after making this one. Thank God she did not! She would have been lost without her work and we would have been so much the poorer without her films.

Mary [one of Ingrid's greatest fans - as if that were not obvious!]

Doesn't quite erupt
The then-scandalous affair between the star and director of "Stromboli" was what set it apart from their other films. Love and the volcano erupted -- but the box office didn't. "Stromboli" clearly aspires to be a mystical, enriching film, but the plodding dialogue and meandering pace bog it down.

Karin (Ingrid Bergman) is a Czech refugee living in a camp, desperate to escape but unable to. She finds her doorway out when she meets the Italian soldier Antonio (Mario Vitale), who asks her to marry him. Karin doesn't love him back, but she agrees to get out of there. Bingo, that's what they do. They are married, and Karin leaves.

But Antonio comes from the island of Stromboli, a volcanic place occupied mostly by hardy tuna fishermen. And in some ways, it is as much a prison for her as the refugee camp. The village is backward and isolated, the people unfriendly, the mindsets narrow and Antonio seems like a stranger. Karin's desperation starts to grow, especially when she learns she is pregnant.

Rossellini's style was one of neo-realism, as much realism as a film can have while still being fictional. "Stromboli" was filmed on location (in ridiculously primitive surroundings), with most of the cast made up of local fishermen that Rossellini recruited for his movie. Bergman even had to climb the volcano and live in a shack with no electricity and plumbing.

The stark, bleak shots of the island and its tiny village are amazing, breathtaking. They help convey the black-and-white simplicity and roughness of life there. But Rossellini's peculiar filming methods take away from the bleakness of it. He improvised as he went, with no fixed script, and the resulting scenes feel poorly thought-out (Bergman gets upset over and over and over). However, this wasn't entirely Rossellini's fault; the Hollywood studio got its hedge clippers on "Stromboli," stripping away much of the atmosphere and quite a bit of the plotline.

Bergman's outstanding acting skills are what elevate the film above "mediocre." With her subtlely expressive face and eyes, she draws in our sympathy and understanding for Karin in a very trying situation, even though the character is a deeply underdeveloped one. At times, she is revealed to be also a bit selfish and manipulative. Mario Vitale does a fair job as Bergman's tradition-bound, rather close-minded husband, who has little idea of her suffering.

"Stromboli" is far from a masterpiece, but it's not a dud either. Bergman and the island are stunning, but the choppy, wandering storyline takes away from what could have been truly breathtaking.

A spiritual film
Stromboli is one of my favorite films. It contains many themes; love, rootlessnes, acceptance of one's fate, the power of nature, man/woman's relationship to God/the universe. The whole film is situated in a very gritty post-war reality. I found this movie,in it's own quiet, understated way, a very spiritual film.

I loved the ending. Great.

Ingrid Bergman's first film with Roberto Rossellini
"Stromboli" was the first film Ingrid Bergman made with Roberto Rossellini during their scandalous relationship that made the actress persona non grata in Hollywood. This 1950 film features Bergman as Karin, a Czech refugee who gets out of a displaced person's camp by marrying a young Italian ex-soldier, Antonio (Mario Vitale). He takes Karin back home to the island of Stromboli in the Tyrrhenian Sea. But Karin is passionate and life on the island is boring in the extreme. She has nothing in common with her young husband, who spends his time fishing for tuna, while the local priest (Renzo Cesana) can only offer platitudes. Only with the young lighthouse keeper (Mario Sponza) does Karin find any friendship. Antonio imprisons Karin in the home and beats her because of his suspicions about her relationship with the man from the lighthouse. When she discovers she is pregnant, Karin flees to the volcano and her fate.

That sounds melodramatic, but wait until you see the ending Hollywood gave to this 1950 film when it was released in the U.S. Whatever Rosselini's original vision, there is agreement that the film's atmosphere, not to mention the coherence of the story, were destroyed by the studio. "Stromboli" features the neo-realism that Rossellini made famous in "Open City" and "Paisan," which meant he had local villagers and fisherman in the roles. Rossellini also had no script, just shooting scenes as he went along, although he had to go back and reshoot an opening scene once he knew where the film was going to end up. Anyhow, "Stromboli" ends up losing an additional star because of the Hollywood butcher job, but this was not a great film for its director in the first place.

An Appreciation of 'Stromboli'
There are few cinema couples as sadly mismatched as Karin (Ingrid Bergman) and her Italian husband Antonio (Mario Vitale) and the Italian island of Stromboli looks much better in Nanni Moretti's 'Caro Diario.' No sex, not even sincere displays of affection and a village full of black-clad women who despise Karin, the new girl in town. Ugh! Why even see this movie? Well, have you seen Ingrid Bergman when she was so young and beautiful - perhaps in 'Notorious' with Cary Grant? Then you know you can spend an hour looking at her and it will seem like a minute. She speaks Italian without the hand gestures and she decorates the home she shares with Antonio with things that remind her of Lithuania (her homeland in the movie.) Antonio tears everything down and puts the pictures of his black-clad relatives back up on the dresser with a statue of the Virgin. Could any couple have more to drive them apart than these two? Rossellini doesn't bother to show much of their personal conflicts. He concentrates his camera on Karin. This is what makes the movie worth watching. Karin is selfish and opportunistic (I think the scene where she tries to charm a helpful priest is a real acting challenge) but of course, she desperately wants to leave Stromboli ... you would, too. Antonio, her husband, is a man who speaks in a dialect she doesn't even fully comprehend. He is a fisherman and he has been a war prisoner for long enough to want to be home again and stay home. Too bad it is an island that rains fire on its inhabitants when the volcano erupts. Too bad for Karin that there are few residents in the town and they are all fishermen. Yes, the movie plods. But the direction and dialogue are perfect for the story and the setting. What makes the movie a treasure is the scene when the fishermen make their big catch of tuna. It is wonderful and illuminates the entire film. ... Read more