#50: La Strada

La Strada (Fellini, 1954)

Of each of the Fellini films I've seen, La Strada fits the mold the least. It's the least verbose and has the simplest themes. It's also the earliest film I've seen of his by about six years, so I suppose that makes sense. The plot is very simple. A poor isolated rural family sends their daughter to work with a circus performer because one less mouth to feed would ease their financial stress. The girl, Gelsomina has been isolated her whole life to the point of being extremely naive and vulnerable. The circus performer, Zampano, is impulsive, heartless, and hedonistic, and Gelsomina has no defense mechanisms to deal with that. He hits her in order to get her to learn the tasks as his assistant, he leaves her on a street corner all night to have a one night stand, and basically treats her like garbage, and gradually breaks her fragile innocence.

It's a good film, but the themes are a bit too obvious and easy, and the character of Gelsomina while she starts out charming, starts grating on your nerves, especially if you watch the film a second time. I'd call it an important film as part of the Neo-Realism movement, but clearly came before Fellini found his stride.

Rating: *** 1/2 / 5

77/101

Next: The General, Sansho the Baliff

New films:

Machete 7/10

Exactly what it's supposed to be. If it looks like something you'll like, you'll like it. Delightful over the top action.

Lebanon 9/10

A tank movie from Israel that takes the point of view from inside the tank. We only see out of the tank through the scope. It's really intense, and really focuses on the emotions of the characters as they're constantly in danger and constantly forced to do things they consider morally atrocious because they've been ordered to, or because they could be killed if they don't. The movie presents to us the chaos of war and the way it devalues life, from the perspective of sympathetic, frightened characters. What really makes the film unique is the presentation style and the great camera work.