Portraying a common phenomenon at the time by zooming in on a single representative story, Rossellini picks the period right after the September 8th 1943 declaration of the Armistice between Italy and the Allied armed forces who occupied the southern part of the country. During this period of transition, many Italians in the northern parts, still controlled by the Fascists, provided shelter to Allied POWs, even at the clear risk to their lives if caught.

The film tells the story of Esperia (Giovanna Ralli), a black marketeer that hides three soldiers (American, Brit and Russian) in her attic in Nazi occupied Rome. The soldiers develop deep relationships among themselves and their host despite the ongoing communication challenge, undoubtedly to show that helping the other doesn’t require much other than good will in the face of hardships.

Helping Esperia in her trying quest, is her boyfriend Renato (Renato Balducci) that continues with his reckless amorous lover portrayal he did two years earlier, in one of the emblematic masterpieces of the Italian comedy genre;  Big Deal on Madonna Street – I Soliti Ignoti (Mario Monicelli – 1958). This typecasting for the sake of comic relief, I find works well here.

The film boasts Rossellini’s signature rough black and white color template that reinforces his documentaristic style to convey people and events as they were. In fact, the film opens like a news bulletin with a voice over in English that sets the historical context for the plot.

And like in most Rossellini’s films, his brother Renzo Rossellini provides a score that offers a continuous tensed ambiance to support the immense risk Esperia took on herself constantly surrounded by invisible prying eyes that can abruptly compromise her safety and that of the soldiers.

With all the craziness of war around us, I found it still amazing that despite all mankind achievements, the human brain can sometimes be so binarily wired; one or zero, black or white love or hate. I call for realignment.

>Buy this film

Open wide spaces of panoramic desert views, soldiers perched high on their guard in an ancient, semi destructed fortress, waiting for an unseen enemy – the tartars – that for years and years never comes. Despite this inactivity, there is a total obedience to rules and regulations in the face of a non-existent enemy, which at times creates social frictions as one fellow soldier forgets the day’s password and get shot by the sentry.

The film brings about a philosophical and I would say timely question, what do you do when you’re surrounded by omni-present threat that never materialized to the point when it finally begins to appear in the horizon – its  occurences are automatically hushed down among the troops in order to retain the status quo of inaction.

There are two options: You can acknowledge danger’s presence and be prepared when it arrives and act; or you can completely ignore it and sink into bored passivity. The choice presented in this film, is literally keeping a middle ground of watching the horizon, yet ignoring what gradually manifested itself.

Sounds familiar no? A lot like what drove our global economy down these days. The signs for the looming tsunami were there all along, but the watch guards chose to ignore their existence completely and treat them as false mirage.

In this classic masterpiece, director Valerio Zurlini adapted Dino Buzzati’s 1940 novel, shot in Iran’s Bam enigmatic Citadel, boasting Europe’s most famous actors such as Vittorio Gassman, Philippe Noiret, and Jean-Louis Trintignant. The film was produced by Jacques Perrin, you may recognize by his later role as older Toto in 1988 Cinema Paradiso and brought to life by the tense score of maestro Ennio Morricone.

>Buy this film

In tempi come questi, la fuga è l’unico mezzo che rimane
per mantenersi vìvi e continuare a sognare.

In times like these, escape is the only mean available
for keeping alive and continue dreaming.

- Henry Laborit

This film opens up with this quote to set the stage for a simple truth; sometimes we need to go out of our comfort zones, venture into new environments, take a few steps back – to allow us to evaluate from afar our goals and dreams.

Director Gabriele Salvatores brings together a group of soldiers during world war II that as part of their mission OC (Observation & Communication) found themselves deserted on a Greek island. This “bubble existence” on this Homeric island, sheltering the soldiers from the havocs of war brings the troupe to evaluate their personal priorities and their interests in life. For example, lieutenant Montini is connected back to his painting as he remodeled the local church, piccolo Farina finally finds love with Vassilissa, the local prostitute turned Taverna owner.

The film has three distinct parts: the troupe arrival on the island, life on the island, and the reunion on the island. You may consider this as new experience creation, living the experience and finally fast-forwarding into the future by revisiting the experience many years later. The first part deals with the transition of the troupe from the external world of war and their clear duties in it into second part – the idyllic life on the island where out of being disconnected, the soldiers are left to explore their personal truths. Finally, the last part offers another perspective from the advantage of time passed, about what this experience on the island really meant.

All soldiers provide a brilliant performance reflecting diverse backgrounds of different parts of Italy. This mixed bag of characters offers plenty moments of humor and memorable dialogs that will keep you smiling days after watching.

And lastly the film is supported by the enchanting soundtrack by Giancarlo Bigazzi that supports the slow, carefree Mediterranean life on the Island of Oblivion as the soldiers call it. In this sense, the film is both about the essence of escape and at the same time provides escape to viewers following the narrative within the confines of entertainment as an outlet from the mundane. If you’re still unconvinced, well the film won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1991.

The final scene shows sergente Lorusso sitting accompanied by his now older comrades, turning his head back into an unknown point. I’d say this simple head movement is like looking back into the past, saying we shouldn’t wait a lifetime to do the things we really care about.

>Buy this film

Known as the father of the Neorealist film movement with his emblematic masterpiece Rome Open City – Roma Citta’ Aperta (1945), Roberto Rossellini in 1950 decides to change direction. Seeing the role of cinema as mirroring a constantly evolving reality, he believes Italy has changed and there is no reason for producing more films about rough realities placed in bombarded cities. Italy in the early 1950’s is going through reconstruction that dramatically affects the fabric of society.

Hence, the rationale for moving away from Neorealism and towards what is known as the psychological human drama that focuses on the individual with themes of alienation, loneliness and more specifically of a woman who suffers. In other words, turning the ordinary story of the individual into the extraordinary. Stromboli is part of this human trilogy that includes Europa 51’ (1952) and Voyage in Italy – Viaggio in Italia (1955). The trilogy is also known as “Ingrid Trilogy” because of the participation of Ingrid Bergman in all three films, a fact that in those days created a huge controversy both in Italy and the United States. It all started when Bergman at the peak of her career wrote a letter to Rossellini:

Dear Mr. Rossellini, I saw your films Open City and Paisan, and enjoyed them very much. If you need a Swedish actress who speaks English very well, who has not forgotten her German, who is not very understandable in French, and who in Italian knows only “ti amo”, I am ready to come and make a film with you. Ingrid Bergman (source: Wikipedia)

Shortly after they started working together on Stromboli and becoming a couple, each leaving their spouse and kids. Rossellini at the time was having an affair with Anna Magnani – one of Italy’s leading actresses known for her passionate, down-to-earth roles. As a result Bergman was black listed for 7 years in Hollywood and Rossellini’s film was harshly criticized in Italy that saw this development as breaking a taboo. Interestingly, had this extramarital affair occured in the early 1960’s during the indulgent years of La Dolce Vita – reactions would have probably been milder. In this context, the film tells the story of Karin (Ingrid Bergman) that as a way to escape a prisoners’ camp marries a fisherman, Antonio (Mario Vitale) who takes her to his home on the island of Stromboli.

The island is part of the Aeolian islands and is portrayed as an island of hell battered by strong winds and frequent eruptions of a volcano that disrupts the lives of the villagers. Into this reality Karin is brought to live and quickly she finds herself unable to adjust. She sees herself much more sophisticated then the locals and pragmatic as she is, she soon tries to escape the island. The film follows Karin as she gradually sheds off her materialistic and opportunistic views of life facing the punishing forces of nature around her (hence the reason behind the title Stromboli – The land of God – Terra di Dio) – and the need to look for answers within herself instead of outside.

>Buy this film