Roma città aperta

4. Juni 1944. Die Wehrmacht räumt Rom. Nur zwei Monate später beginnt Rossellini mit den Arbeiten an diesem Film, der zum Synonym für „Neorealismus“ wird: gedreht in realen Straßen und Wohnungen, bestückt mit einem Chor von Laien, die gestern noch Beteiligte oder Zeugen der Geschehnisse waren. Zu den zerstörten Studios gesellen sich desolates Material, fehlendes Geld, primitive Technik und chaotische Umstände. Aus all dem der heftige Atem der Realität, der ROMA CITTÀ APERTA umweht. Das erste filmische Zeugnis der RESISTENZA, Würdigung jener „Armee des Untergrunds“, in der Marxisten und Priester Seite an Seite gekämpft haben.

On June 4, 1944, the Wehrmacht withdrew from Rome. Just two months later, Rossellini began to work on ROMA, CITTÀ APERTA, a film that started off as a failure, only to soon become a portentous synonym for Italian neorealism. This cinematic reaction to moments of dark history, barely one step in the past, was filmed in real streets and apartments and populated with a largely non-professional cast, people who were only yesterday still participating in or witnessing the events now being depicted. Desolation reigned on the set, as destroyed studios came together with abysmal film stock, a lack of money, primitive technology, and chaotic working conditions. Two professional actors found themselves surrounded by a lay collective made up of children, women, and apartment-block residents. All of this fanned a fierce wind of reality, which blows straight through ROMA, CITTÀ APERTA. A sense of vehement sympathy suffuses the subject matter: the first cinematic testimony to the resistenza and a homage to the partisan movement. In tribute to an “underground army” where Marxists and priests fought side by side, Rossellini forged a great drama of solidarity and unity beyond all borders and confines of society. Against fascism, forever and for all.