Neorealism In The Italian Film

In this essay I will be explaining neo-realism and the stages it went through and how it affected cinema and will also talk about André Bazin and his work in regards to neo-realism.

Neo-realism originates from the Italian and is known today as Italian neorealism and is also considered as the golden age for the Italian film industry.

The neorealism is also known to be quite larger than just film it’s a movement that is in politics and in socialism and is clearly seen as a movement made by the Italian people to provide reality to their people and to the world and they used that concept through their cinema.

Much like the French new wave a new movement was being developed in Italian cinema in the after math of World War 2 but instead of being

Even though Italian neorealism got a start almost 20 years before the French new wave their origins where very similar. And the pioneers of the neorealist movement went on to inspire the major instigators of the French new wave for example many of the film makers of the neorealist movement got their start as film critics. Such as the film maker Giuseppe de santis and others. Several neorealist directors wrote for a magazine called cinema that was run by Mussolini’s son ‘Vittorio Mussolini’. The presence of Vittorio who was also a film producers made the subjects of politics of limits for the writers so instead they criticized what was called Telephoni Bianchi films, these films where pretty much all the films being made in the film industry at the time. Telefoni bianchi roughly translates as white telephone and refers to clones of comedy films made in the American cinema during the 1930’s. Those films tended to be socially conservative, promoting family values, respect for authority, and all the things that can back up the factious regime. Italian neorealist movies would take the opposite approach.

The first neo-realist film to be created in Italy was known as ‘obsession’ by luchino Visconti’ made in 1943.This film was concentrating on the laboring class of Italy. Visconti shot the film in a distance, almost all in wide and medium shots rather than close-ups which is a characteristic of the Italian neorealist films where the director would like to focus on the whole scene and other people in the background rather than in the actual