Stromboli (1950 Film)
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

''Stromboli'', also known as ''Stromboli, Land of God'' (), is a 1950 Italian-American film directed by
Roberto Rossellini Roberto Gastone Zeffiro Rossellini (8 May 1906 – 3 June 1977) was an Italian film director, producer, and screenwriter. He was one of the most prominent directors of the Italian neorealist cinema, contributing to the movement with films such ...
and starring
Ingrid Bergman Ingrid Bergman (29 August 191529 August 1982) was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films, television movies, and plays.Obituary ''Variety'', 1 September 1982. With a career spanning five decades, she is often ...
. The drama is considered a classic example of Italian neorealism.


Plot

Bergman plays Karin, a displaced
Lithuanian Lithuanian may refer to: * Lithuanians * Lithuanian language * The country of Lithuania * Grand Duchy of Lithuania * Culture of Lithuania * Lithuanian cuisine * Lithuanian Jews as often called "Lithuanians" (''Lita'im'' or ''Litvaks'') by other Jew ...
in Italy, who secures release from an
internment Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simpl ...
camp by marrying an Italian ex-POW fisherman (Mario Vitale), whom she meets in the camp. He promises her a great life in his home island of
Stromboli Stromboli ( , ; scn, Struògnuli ) is an island in the Tyrrhenian Sea, off the north coast of Sicily, containing Mount Stromboli, one of the four active volcanoes in Italy. It is one of the eight Aeolian Islands, a volcanic arc north of Sici ...
, a volcanic island located between the mainland of Italy and
Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...
. She soon discovers that Stromboli is very harsh and barren, not at all what she expected, and the people, very traditional and conservative, many fishermen, show hostility and disdain towards this foreign woman who does not follow their ways. Karin becomes increasingly despondent and eventually decides to escape the volcano island.


Cast

*
Ingrid Bergman Ingrid Bergman (29 August 191529 August 1982) was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films, television movies, and plays.Obituary ''Variety'', 1 September 1982. With a career spanning five decades, she is often ...
as Karin * Mario Vitale as Antonio *
Renzo Cesana Renzo Cesana (30 October 1907, Rome – 8 November 1970, Hollywood, California) was an actor, writer, composer, and songwriter most famed for his title role on the American television show ''The Continental (1952 TV series), The Continental''. He ...
as The Priest * Mario Sponzo as The Man from the Lighthouse * Gaetano Famularo as Man with Guitar * Angelo Molino as Baby, uncredited Most villagers are played by actual people from the island, as is typical of neorealism.


Background

The film is the result of a famous letter from Ingrid Bergman to Roberto Rossellini, in which she wrote that she admired his work and wanted to make a movie with him. Rossellini and she set up a joint production company for the film, Societ per Azioni Berit (Berit Films, sometimes written as Bero Films), and she also helped Rossellini to secure a production and distribution deal with
RKO RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheu ...
and its then owner,
Howard Hughes Howard Robard Hughes Jr. (December 24, 1905 – April 5, 1976) was an American business magnate, record-setting pilot, engineer, film producer, and philanthropist, known during his lifetime as one of the most influential and richest people in th ...
, thus securing most of the budget together with international distribution for the film. Originally, she had approached Samuel Goldwyn, but he bowed out after having seen Rossellini's film '' Germany, Year Zero''.TCM: ''Stromboli – Notes''
Linked 2013-10-20
The terms of Rossellini's contract with RKO stated that all footage had to be turned over to RKO, which would edit an American version of the film, based on Rossellini's Italian version. However, the US version was eventually made without the director's input. Rossellini protested, and claimed that RKO's 81-minute version was radically different from his original 105-minute version. Rossellini obtained support from Father Félix Morlión, who had been involved in the screenwriting. He sent a telegram to Joseph Breen, director of
MPPDA The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios#Present, five major film studios of the United States, as well as the video streaming service Netflix. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Pic ...
's
Production Code Administration The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios#Present, five major film studios of the United States, as well as the video streaming service Netflix. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Pic ...
, urging him to compare the original script with the RKO version, as he felt that the religious theme he had written into the screenplay had been lost.AFI Catalog of Feature Films: ''Stromboli – Notes''
Linked 2013-10-20
The conflict eventually led to Rossellini and RKO taking legal action against each other over the international distribution rights to the film. The exact outcome is unknown, but the unrestored RKO version of the film, as distributed, is 102–105 minutes long. It lists credits that were missing in the first RKO version, but it still has 1950 as the production year, and the same MPAA number as the 81-minute version. This indicates that the differences were resolved rather quickly. Some confusion surrounds the Italian release date of the film. Modern sources list the release year as either 1949 or 1950, but an
Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
article dated March 12, 1950, reported that the film had not yet been shown publicly in Italy. Apparently, few Italians had a chance to see the film until it was screened at the 11th Venice International Film Festival on August 26, 1950.Dagrada, Elena. "A Triple Alliance for a Catholic Neorealism: Roberto Rossellini According to Felix Norton, Giulio Andreotti and Gian Luigi Rondi." ''Moralizing Cinema: Film, Catholicism, and Power.'' Eds. Daniel Biltereyst and Daniela Treveri Gennari. Routledge, 2014. ''Stromboli'' is perhaps best remembered for the extramarital affair between Rossellini and Bergman that began during the production of the film, as well as their child born out of wedlock a few weeks before the film's American release. In fact, the affair caused such a scandal in the United States that church groups, women's clubs, and legislators in more than a dozen states around the country called for the film to be banned, and Bergman was denounced as "a powerful influence for evil" on the floor of the US Senate by Colorado Senator
Edwin C. Johnson Edwin Carl Johnson (January 1, 1884 – May 30, 1970) was an American politician of the Democratic Party who served as both governor of and U.S. senator from the state of Colorado. Background Johnson was born in Scandia in Republic County in ...
. Furthermore, Bergman's Hollywood career was halted for a number of years, until she won an
Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
for her performance in ''
Anastasia Anastasia (from el, Ἀναστασία, translit=Anastasía) is a feminine given name of Greek origin, derived from the Greek word (), meaning "resurrection". It is a popular name in Eastern Europe, particularly in Russia, where it was the most ...
.''


Critical reception

In Italy, ''Stromboli'' was awarded the Rome Prize for Cinema as the best film of the year. Initial reception for ''Stromboli'' in America, however, was very negative. Bosley Crowther of ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' opened his review by writing: "After all the unprecedented interest that the picture 'Stromboli' has aroused — it being, of course, the fateful drama which Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini have made — it comes as a startling anticlimax to discover that this widely heralded film is incredibly feeble, inarticulate, uninspiring and painfully banal." Crowther added that Bergman's character "is never drawn with clear and revealing definition, due partly to the vagueness of the script and partly to the dullness and monotony with which Rossellini has directed her." The staff at '' Variety'' agreed, writing, "Director Roberto Rossellini purportedly denied responsibility for the film, claiming the American version was cut by RKO beyond recognition. Cut or not cut, the film reflects no credit on him. Given elementary-school dialog to recite and impossible scenes to act, Ingrid Bergman's never able to make the lines real nor the emotion sufficiently motivated to seem more than an exercise ... The only visible touch of the famed Italian director is in the hard photography, which adds to the realistic, documentary effect of life on the rocky, lava-blanketed island. Rossellini's penchant for realism, however, does not extend to Bergman. She's always fresh, clean and well-groomed." ''
Harrison's Reports ''Harrison's Reports'' was a New York City-based motion picture trade journal published weekly from 1919 to 1962. The typical issue was four letter-size pages sent to subscribers under a second-class mail permit. Its founder, editor and publisher ...
'' wrote: "As entertainment, it does have a few moments of distinction, but on the whole it is a dull slow-paced piece, badly edited and mediocre in writing, direction and acting." John McCarten of ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' found that there was "nothing whatsoever in the footage that rises above the humdrum", and felt that Bergman "doesn't really seem to have her heart in any of the scenes."
Richard L. Coe Richard Livingston Coe (New York City, November 8, 1914 – Washington, D.C., November 12, 1995) was a theater and cinema critic for The Washington Post for more than forty years. Coe became known as one of the most influential theater critics outsi ...
of ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' lamented, "It's a pity that many people who never go to foreign-made pictures will be drawn into this by the Rossellini-Bergman names and will think that this flat, drab, inept picture is what they've been missing." In Britain, '' The Monthly Film Bulletin'' was also negative, writing that Rossellini's "extempore method is sadly out of place in a film dealing with personal relationships and, although there are indications that Karin is intended to be a complex and interesting character, these are never developed, and her motives and actions remain unpredictable. Other characters have no real identity, and hardly begin to come alive ... Ingrid Bergman makes a gallant effort with a part ill-conceived and scripted, and calling for a personality and quality which she cannot command." Recent assessments have been more positive. Reviewing the film in 2013 in conjunction with its DVD release as part of The Criterion Collection,
Dave Kehr David Kehr (born 1953) is an American museum curator and film critic. For many years a critic at the ''Chicago Reader'' and the ''Chicago Tribune,'' he later wrote a weekly column for ''The New York Times'' on DVD releases. He later became a c ...
called the film "one of the pioneering works of modern European filmmaking." In an expansive analysis of the film, critic Fred Camper wrote of the drama, "Like many of cinema's masterpieces, ''Stromboli'' is fully explained only in a final scene that brings into harmony the protagonist's state of mind and the imagery. This structure...suggests a belief in the transformative power of revelation. Forced to drop her suitcase (itself far more modest than the trunks she arrived with) as she ascends the volcano, Karin is stripped of her pride and reduced — or elevated — to the condition of a crying child, a kind of first human being who, divested of the trappings of self, must learn to see and speak again from a personal "year zero" (to borrow from another Rossellini film title)." The
Venice Film Festival The Venice Film Festival or Venice International Film Festival ( it, Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica della Biennale di Venezia, "International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art of the Venice Biennale") is an annual film festival he ...
ranked ''Stromboli'' among the 100 most important Italian films ("
100 film italiani da salvare The list of the ''100 Italian films to be saved'' ( it, 100 film italiani da salvare) was created with the aim to report "100 films that have changed the collective memory of the country between 1942 and 1978". History The project was established ...
") from 1942–1978. In 2012, the
British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, ...
's '' Sight & Sound'' critics' poll also listed it as one of the 250 greatest films of all time.


Box office

The film opened Feb. 15, 1950 in the United States and was a box-office bomb, but did better overseas, where Bergman and Rossellini's affair was considered less scandalous. In all, RKO lost $200,000 on the picture.


See also

* Strombolian eruption * Almadraba — the tuna-fishing technique documented in the film * '' The War of the Volcanoes'' — A 2012 Italian documentary film about the filming of ''Stromboli'' and ''
Vulcano Vulcano ( scn, Vurcanu) or Vulcan is a small volcanic island belonging to Italy in the Tyrrhenian Sea, about north of Sicily and located at the southernmost end of the seven Aeolian Islands. The island is known for its volcanic activity and c ...
''


References


External links

* * *
lobby poster

''Modern Marriage on Stromboli''
an essay by
Dina Iordanova Dina Iordanova (born 1960) is an educationalist and Professor of Film Studies at the University of St. Andrews. A specialist in world cinema, her special expertise is in the cinema of the Balkans, Eastern Europe, and Europe in general. Her research ...
at the
Criterion Collection The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films." Criterion serves film and media scholars, cinep ...
{{Authority control 1950 films 1950 drama films Italian drama films 1950s Italian-language films English-language Italian films Italian neorealist films American black-and-white films Films about immigration to Italy Films directed by Roberto Rossellini Films set in Italy Films set in Sicily Films set in the Mediterranean Sea Films set on islands RKO Pictures films American drama films American multilingual films Italian multilingual films Films scored by Renzo Rossellini Italian black-and-white films 1950s American films 1950s Italian films