LA STRADA

Giulietta Masina and Anthony Quinn

LA STRADA (aka The Road/1954). Director: Federico Fellini.

After her older sister, Rose, passes away, Gelsomina (Giulietta Masina, wife of Fellini) is sold by her mother to the strong man Zampano (Anthony Quinn) for 10,000 lira. The odd couple travel around the countryside while Gelsomina aids him in his act, which simply consists of his breaking a chain across his chest. Zampano is brutish and insensitive, while Gelsomina is a fragile, child-like (although not necessarily simple-minded) creature  -- in some ways self-absorbed as only a child can be -- who only wants to be loved. The twosome arrive at a circus where they encounter "the fool" (Richard Basehart), an ever-laughing, sarcastic man who does a top-drawer high wire act and in his own way can be just as insensitive to Gelsomina as Zampano is. The conflict between the two men leads to tragedy, and traumatizes Gelsomina. Her half hysterical half-numb state gets on Zampano's nerves and only adds to his guilt so he makes a perhaps unwise decision ... La strada is early Fellini from the director's truly great period (which includes Nights of Cabiria and I vitelloni), before he became FEDERICO FELLINI and every picture had to be a grotesque, overblown spectacle (such as Fellini Satyricon) in which the human drama got lost. In La strada Fellini never forgets that he is doing a character study of two disparate individuals and the film is all the better for it. Quinn offers another magnificent portrayal in the movie, and he is matched by Masina, who may seem at first like a distaff Harpo Marx but who finally etches a very affecting and convincing portrait. Basehart [Tension] is given a less defined role but is fine. With excellent photography from Otello Martelli [Stromboli] and a poignant and lovely score by Nino Rota, La strada is a very moving experience. One could quibble about certain aspects (what exactly happened to Rose, for instance?), but this is still a remarkable motion picture. Some people feel sorry for Zampano at the end, but considering his behavior I ultimately find him much more pathetic than sympathetic.

Verdict: Fellini at his best. ***1/2.

LE NOTTI BIANCHI

Schell and Mastroianni

LE NOTTI BIANCHI (1957). Director: Luchino Visconti.

Mario (Marcello Mastroianni). a lonely man in Livorno, meets Natalia (Maria Schell), who tells him that she is waiting patiently any day now for a lover (Jean Marais of Fantomas) who swore he would return to her in one year. Mario can't believe Natalia can actually think that her lover will come back, and he pursues a romance with her even as she ponders her future with her lover and finds herself drawn to Mario in spite of herself. Mario promises to deliver a letter to the man in question to see if he still feels the same about Natalia, but will he actually follow through?  ... Le notti bianchi is a little gem of a movie, beginning with an exquisite theme by Nino Rota, and taking place on beautifully designed sound stages in Cinecitta. The camera roams all over these impressive sets even as a sad older woman (Clara Calamai of Deep Red), an aging prostitute who has a yen for Mario herself, roams through the city. Despite the fact that Mastroianni is miscast -- his actions and dialogue are those of a younger man, and he is much more sophisticated in appearance than his character -- he is still superb, delineating all of Mario's passion, yearning, and inner torment with great skill. Schell is also quite good, as are Marais and Calamai and the actors who play Natalia's nearly-blind grandmother  (Marcella Rovena) and her tenants. Giuseppe Rotunno's cinematography is marvelous, as is Rota's sensitive scoring. The film, based on a short story by Dostoevsky, has an uncompromising and moving finale. A strange scene has Mario and Natalia encountering an entire family, including a small child, apparently living under a bridge in the middle of winter, but neither of them remark upon it. There is a fairly long sequence in a club with Mario and Natalia joining in when everyone, including a snappy dancer named Dirk Sanders, begins gyrating to Bill Haley and the Comets' "Thirteen Women." This is an abrupt change in tone, but it works. Visconti also directed the notable Bellissima and many others.

Verdict: Exactingly-made, dream-like and hauntingly beautiful. ***1/2.

THE LEOPARD

Burt Lancaster and Alain Delon

THE LEOPARD (aka Il gattopardo/1963). Director: Luchino Visconti. Three hour Italian version with sub-titles.

"I've had seven children with her and I've never seen her navel." -- Fabrizio referring to his wife.

During the tumultuous changes in 19th century Italy, the aristocratic Prince Fabrizio (Burt Lancaster) lives with his family in a palace with more rooms than he can count. His nephew, Tancredi (Alain Delon), joins Garibaldi's forces at first but fights for the king later on. The prince's daughter, Concetta (Lucilla Morlacchi), is in love with Tancredi, but the latter prefers the more beautiful Angelica (Claudia Cardinale), and not just because her father, Don Sedara (Paolo Stoppa), a former peasant, has become wealthy. Sedara is basically treated with contempt by the prince and his family because he represents a new type of Italian citizen, a type that Fabrizio fears will eventually supplant the aristocracy. The Leopard has its most interesting scenes in the first quarter, depicting the ravages of war, and the second half struggles to find strong human drama in its situations. You keep waiting for something to happen, but it never quite does. Will the triangle situation with Concetta, Tancredi, and Angelique cause major difficulties? No. Will Don Sedara stop acting the buffoon and tell off the prince and his relatives? No. Will Fabrizio's children resent how Tancredi is treated more like a son than a nephew? No. There's nothing necessarily wrong in a more low-key approach, but one wishes that there had been more incident and dramatic vitality considering the three hour running time.

Even more problematic is the fact that The Leopard, despite its interesting and often attractive period settings, is not that well-directed. Even the supposedly famous long ballroom sequence near the close of the film lacks the kind of sweep and pageantry, the especially skillful camera work, that one would find in similar scenes in American films. The Leopard simply lacks greatness. The film is much admired in certain quarters -- one imdb. critic certainly overstated things by claiming it might be "the greatest motion picture of all time" [!] -- and there are things to admire (Nino Rota has written a lovely score for the film, for instance) but the characters are mostly unsympathetic and the picture becomes tedious just when you're expecting things to really develop. It's as if some people think The Leopard must be great because it's three hours long and made in Italy.

As for the acting, it's hard to judge Lancaster's performance because it's dubbed -- and judging from the American version, which is about 25 minutes shorter and uses Lancaster's real voice -- it's just as well. In the U.S. version, Lancaster doesn't seem remotely like a 19th century Italian aristocrat; he did much, much better work in The Swimmer. Delon  [Joy House] is more on the mark as his nephew, but Cardinale [Blindfold], who is not photographed that flatteringly, sometimes comes off as if she's mentally deficient. Stoppa, Morlacchi, and Romolo Valli as Father Perrone are more memorable.

Verdict: Watch The Damned or Ludwig instead. **.