Film History II
Lecture Week 8: Italian Neorealism
Realism of film vs. Realism in film
Realism of film:
- Refers to film as a medium in general
- ‘Impression of reality’ argument: Film feels more life-like than a novel/painting/drama
onstage
- ‘Indexicality’ argument: Film is based on photography and as such records reality more
faithfully than other media
- Realist film theorists: André Bazin and Siegfried Kracauer
3 ways to look at realism:
1. Realism a period/epoch:
- Neorealist cinema as the filmic strand within the period of neorealism in Italy
o Mid-19th century French realism: novels of Flaubert and paintings of Courbert
o Mid-20th century Italian neorealism: Novels of Italo Calvino, plays by Leopold Trieste,
films by Vittorio de Sica, Roberto Rossellini and Luchino Visconti
2. Realism as style:
- 3 tendencies:
1 - Realism as a form of transparency or illusion:
o Style of film disappears
o Foregrounding of the story
o Classical Hollywood style as realist
2 - Realism as deviation from predominant modes of presentation:
o Signaling of differences between contrasting works of art
o Film historical context important:
Particular films are considered realist in comparison to other films not seen as realist
o Bazin: Realism (Soviet montage school neorealism) vs. aestheticism (German
Expressionism, Hollywood)
3 - Realism as strong form of mimesis:
o Fictional world strongly resembles the real world as we know it
o Concentration on what is geographically and historically close to us
3. Realism as viewing mode:
- Semio-pragmatic perspective
- Stylistic forms and narrative modes too heterogenous to define a film as realist
- Boundaries between realist and non-realist films too fuzzy
, - Viewing a film as realist depends on various parameters:
o Cultural context
o Historical context
o Institutional context
o Individual competences and preferences
- Diegetization:
o The viewers’ mental construction of a fictional filmic world (a diegesis)
o Diegeses stands in opposition to the real world of a documentary film
o Realist diegetization: fictional world strongly resembles real world as we know it
o Only a necessary condition but not a sufficient condition
- Narrativization
o The viewer’s construction of the events as a narrative
o Not just a perception of a lose succession of events
Images and sounds presented need to be put into a sequence of events with
cause-and-effect chains
Turning the plot (or syuzhet) into the story (or fabula)
o Realist films tend to downplay traditional dramaturgy
o They deemphasize suspense, happy endings and genre conventions
o Preference for episodic forms of narration with open endings
o Less intertextually interwoven with other films
o Less self-reflexive
o Less determined by narrator: film seems to narrate itself
Narrative ‘reality effect’:
- Term by Roland Barthens
- Viewer’s perception of events that are seemingly superfluous and without a clear function
within what would otherwise be a tight plot
External and internal markers
External:
- Paratexts like film reviews that describe the film as realistic
- Viewing contexts in which a film is watched
o Arthouse cinema vs multiplex
o Film festival
o A film history class on neorealism
Internal:
- Films that want to be read in a realist way use particular devices and themes in a
foregrounded way
- They ostentatiously present themselves as realist
Other viewing modes:
Auteur mode: Categorizing the film as a de Sica film
- Search for the signature style of Vittorio de Sica
- Comparison to Shoeshine, Umberto D., Marriage Italian Style and The garden of the Finzi-
Continis
,Genre mode: Focusing on what makes this film comparable to a classical melodrama
- Melodramatic music
- Victimhood of the main character
- Touching character of the little son etc.
Aesthetic mode: Concentrating on the stylistic and formal features
- Deep-staging composition in some scenes
- The play of the lay actors
- Smooth camera movements
- Sheer beauty of some of the black-and-white shots
Documentary mode: Looking at the physical reality of Rome in 1947
- The way the streets in the Florida area looked where the bike gets stolen
- The modernist suburbs that were being constructed at the time
- The streetcars that crisscross the film at various moments
- The houses and the interior design of the lower-class families after the war
Italian Cinema before neorealism:
- Telefono bianco films
o Romantic comedies known for the luxurious white telephones that played an
important role
Max Ophüls: La Signora di Tutti
- Alessandro Blasetti, Mario Camerini, Raffaello Mattarazzo
Neorealism: Periodization:
- Beginning:
o 1943: Arrest of Mussolini and Ossessione
o 1945: End of the war and Roma, città aperta (Rome, open city)
- End:
o 1948: Last canonical films: Ladri di biciclette, Germania Anno Zero, La terra trema
o 1952: Umberto D.
o 1960: Neorealism secondo?
Characteristics:
- On location:
o Make known to urban Italians the material and social conditions of up to now
unknown areas of the country
o But: some neorealist films featured studio sets
o And: no direct sound but post-synchronization
- Non-actors:
o Many key roles played by non-professionals
o But: Sometimes real actors in the studio dubbed them in postproduction
o Greater authenticity: use of class-inflected sociolects or regional dialects
o But: not all neorealists completely adhered to the idea of using non-actors
, - Episodic narration:
o Downplaying of dramatic aspects
o Films often progressed episodically rather than according to a tightly-knit plot with
dense cause-and-effect chains
o Reliance on ellipses: leaving out of key elements of the story
o Against conventional narrative ‘logic’
o Preference for the assembly of fragments
- Contemporary real-life:
o Initially thematic emphasis on the heroics of anti-fascist and anti-Nazi partisans
o Later: look at ordinary world in post-WWII Italy and its social problems
Widespread unemployment
Alienating working conditions
Disgrace of poverty
The end of neorealism:
- 1948: anti-fascist front breaks apart
- Christian Democrats (Democrazia Cristiana) win the elections
- Strong division between Christians and communists
- 1947 and 1949: Andreotti Laws
o Import limits for foreign films
o Screen quotas for Italian films
o Loans to production companies: preference for apolitical screenplays (pre-
censorship)
- Neorealismo rosa: Pink neorealism
- Comedian Toto
- Sex bombs
- Melodramas and epic costume dramas
- Federico Fellini and Michelangelo Antonioni
Article 1: A Thesis on Neorealism – Cesare Zavattini (1979)
Task of Neorealist artist:
- Bring the audience to reflect upon what they/others are doing
- Stir up emotions and outrage
- Think about reality precisely as it is
Keystone for Neorealism:
- War
- Revelation that war always violates fundamental human needs/values which are so dear to
us
- This revelation = starting point of a human uprising
It was the real, deep thinking man who acted, not the ‘historical man’
Study of the non-abstract man
Cinema was the most direct and immediate way of doing this, showing the real man
Lecture Week 8: Italian Neorealism
Realism of film vs. Realism in film
Realism of film:
- Refers to film as a medium in general
- ‘Impression of reality’ argument: Film feels more life-like than a novel/painting/drama
onstage
- ‘Indexicality’ argument: Film is based on photography and as such records reality more
faithfully than other media
- Realist film theorists: André Bazin and Siegfried Kracauer
3 ways to look at realism:
1. Realism a period/epoch:
- Neorealist cinema as the filmic strand within the period of neorealism in Italy
o Mid-19th century French realism: novels of Flaubert and paintings of Courbert
o Mid-20th century Italian neorealism: Novels of Italo Calvino, plays by Leopold Trieste,
films by Vittorio de Sica, Roberto Rossellini and Luchino Visconti
2. Realism as style:
- 3 tendencies:
1 - Realism as a form of transparency or illusion:
o Style of film disappears
o Foregrounding of the story
o Classical Hollywood style as realist
2 - Realism as deviation from predominant modes of presentation:
o Signaling of differences between contrasting works of art
o Film historical context important:
Particular films are considered realist in comparison to other films not seen as realist
o Bazin: Realism (Soviet montage school neorealism) vs. aestheticism (German
Expressionism, Hollywood)
3 - Realism as strong form of mimesis:
o Fictional world strongly resembles the real world as we know it
o Concentration on what is geographically and historically close to us
3. Realism as viewing mode:
- Semio-pragmatic perspective
- Stylistic forms and narrative modes too heterogenous to define a film as realist
- Boundaries between realist and non-realist films too fuzzy
, - Viewing a film as realist depends on various parameters:
o Cultural context
o Historical context
o Institutional context
o Individual competences and preferences
- Diegetization:
o The viewers’ mental construction of a fictional filmic world (a diegesis)
o Diegeses stands in opposition to the real world of a documentary film
o Realist diegetization: fictional world strongly resembles real world as we know it
o Only a necessary condition but not a sufficient condition
- Narrativization
o The viewer’s construction of the events as a narrative
o Not just a perception of a lose succession of events
Images and sounds presented need to be put into a sequence of events with
cause-and-effect chains
Turning the plot (or syuzhet) into the story (or fabula)
o Realist films tend to downplay traditional dramaturgy
o They deemphasize suspense, happy endings and genre conventions
o Preference for episodic forms of narration with open endings
o Less intertextually interwoven with other films
o Less self-reflexive
o Less determined by narrator: film seems to narrate itself
Narrative ‘reality effect’:
- Term by Roland Barthens
- Viewer’s perception of events that are seemingly superfluous and without a clear function
within what would otherwise be a tight plot
External and internal markers
External:
- Paratexts like film reviews that describe the film as realistic
- Viewing contexts in which a film is watched
o Arthouse cinema vs multiplex
o Film festival
o A film history class on neorealism
Internal:
- Films that want to be read in a realist way use particular devices and themes in a
foregrounded way
- They ostentatiously present themselves as realist
Other viewing modes:
Auteur mode: Categorizing the film as a de Sica film
- Search for the signature style of Vittorio de Sica
- Comparison to Shoeshine, Umberto D., Marriage Italian Style and The garden of the Finzi-
Continis
,Genre mode: Focusing on what makes this film comparable to a classical melodrama
- Melodramatic music
- Victimhood of the main character
- Touching character of the little son etc.
Aesthetic mode: Concentrating on the stylistic and formal features
- Deep-staging composition in some scenes
- The play of the lay actors
- Smooth camera movements
- Sheer beauty of some of the black-and-white shots
Documentary mode: Looking at the physical reality of Rome in 1947
- The way the streets in the Florida area looked where the bike gets stolen
- The modernist suburbs that were being constructed at the time
- The streetcars that crisscross the film at various moments
- The houses and the interior design of the lower-class families after the war
Italian Cinema before neorealism:
- Telefono bianco films
o Romantic comedies known for the luxurious white telephones that played an
important role
Max Ophüls: La Signora di Tutti
- Alessandro Blasetti, Mario Camerini, Raffaello Mattarazzo
Neorealism: Periodization:
- Beginning:
o 1943: Arrest of Mussolini and Ossessione
o 1945: End of the war and Roma, città aperta (Rome, open city)
- End:
o 1948: Last canonical films: Ladri di biciclette, Germania Anno Zero, La terra trema
o 1952: Umberto D.
o 1960: Neorealism secondo?
Characteristics:
- On location:
o Make known to urban Italians the material and social conditions of up to now
unknown areas of the country
o But: some neorealist films featured studio sets
o And: no direct sound but post-synchronization
- Non-actors:
o Many key roles played by non-professionals
o But: Sometimes real actors in the studio dubbed them in postproduction
o Greater authenticity: use of class-inflected sociolects or regional dialects
o But: not all neorealists completely adhered to the idea of using non-actors
, - Episodic narration:
o Downplaying of dramatic aspects
o Films often progressed episodically rather than according to a tightly-knit plot with
dense cause-and-effect chains
o Reliance on ellipses: leaving out of key elements of the story
o Against conventional narrative ‘logic’
o Preference for the assembly of fragments
- Contemporary real-life:
o Initially thematic emphasis on the heroics of anti-fascist and anti-Nazi partisans
o Later: look at ordinary world in post-WWII Italy and its social problems
Widespread unemployment
Alienating working conditions
Disgrace of poverty
The end of neorealism:
- 1948: anti-fascist front breaks apart
- Christian Democrats (Democrazia Cristiana) win the elections
- Strong division between Christians and communists
- 1947 and 1949: Andreotti Laws
o Import limits for foreign films
o Screen quotas for Italian films
o Loans to production companies: preference for apolitical screenplays (pre-
censorship)
- Neorealismo rosa: Pink neorealism
- Comedian Toto
- Sex bombs
- Melodramas and epic costume dramas
- Federico Fellini and Michelangelo Antonioni
Article 1: A Thesis on Neorealism – Cesare Zavattini (1979)
Task of Neorealist artist:
- Bring the audience to reflect upon what they/others are doing
- Stir up emotions and outrage
- Think about reality precisely as it is
Keystone for Neorealism:
- War
- Revelation that war always violates fundamental human needs/values which are so dear to
us
- This revelation = starting point of a human uprising
It was the real, deep thinking man who acted, not the ‘historical man’
Study of the non-abstract man
Cinema was the most direct and immediate way of doing this, showing the real man
