Passion and Defiance: Italian Film from 1942 to the Present

Front Cover
University of California Press, 1984 - 396 pages
Since World War II, aesthetic impulses generated in Italy have swept through every film industry in the world, and in her book Mira Liehm analyses the roots in literature, philosophy, and contemporary Italian life which have contributed to this extraordinary vigor. An introductory chapter offers a unique overview of the Italian cinema before 1942. It is followed by a full and profound discussion of neorealism in its heyday, its difficult aftermath in the fifties, the glorious sixties, and finally by an analysis of the contemporary cinematic crisis. Mira Liehm has known personally many of the leading figures in Italian cinema, and her work is rich in insights into their lives and working methods. This impressive scholarly work immediately outclasses all other available Italian film histories. It will be essential reading for anyone seriously interested in the cinema.
 

Contents

PREFACE
1
OBSESSION 19421944
41
LACRIMAE RERUM 19441948
60
NEOREALISM ACT II 19481953
90
WHAT IS REALITY?
103
NEOREALISM IS LIKE
129
DIFFICULT YEARS 19531959
138
THE RIFT 19591960
160
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE SIXTIES
221
THE CHANGING IMAGE OF THE MOVIES 19701982
249
THE DUSK OF THE LEOPARDS
289
UNDER THE SIGN OF VIOLENCE
307
NOTES
319
BIBLIOGRAPHY
361
INDEX OF NAMES
375
INDEX OF FILMS
383

THE GLORIOUS SIXTIES 19611969
181

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