Luis Bunuel opens his 1953 film “Los Olvidados,” or “The Young and the Damned,” with a disclaimer that explains his film is true, not optimistic and leaves everything to society’s progressive forces to solve. The film is about the poverty, crime and hardship that’s befallen Mexico as a result of the institution. It could very well be the same description as Roberto Rossellini’s “Rome, Open City.”
With “Rome, Open City” in 1945, Rossellini effectively invented the film movement known as “neorealism.” These films shot on location with non-actors and focused on ordinary lives as they were in the world. And starting in 1945 immediately after the war, Rossellini’s War Trilogy that included this film, “Paisan” and “Germany Year Zero”, were scathing indictments and portraits of the Italian lifestyle that had grown out of the war. Its early protagonist Pina (Anna Magnani) is the fiancee of an Italian insurgent named Francesco (Francesco Grandjacquet), and his associate going under the alias Luigi Ferraris (Marcello Pagliero) is being hunted by the Nazis.
But mostly, their casual scheming and getting around officers is a way of life. We see kids playing football in an alley, hiding rebels, talking on the phone with the certainty that the Gestapo are listening, and parenting with all the salt of an Italian household. Even the kids take an involvement in the war, sneaking home late under a secret underground pathway of rubble after staging an explosion on the far side of town. There’s a beautiful shot of them returning home that highlights the poverty and the valor that came out of the war effort. Continue reading “Side by Side: Rome Open City and Los Olvidados”