Gina Lollobrigida’s death on January 16, 2023, inspired us to look back and reflect on an extraordinary era of Italian cinema that spans the neorealism of the 1940s to the early 1970s. During that time, numerous directors with different styles brought Italy to life on the big screen, and the actresses became as well-known around the world as any Hollywood star. They were divas and anti-divas whose beauty, charisma and glamour left an indelible mark on world cinema.
This reminder of some of the most important female artists of the era may also encourage us to rediscover some classic titles, films that are in danger of being forgotten and stories worth revisiting; most can be found on streaming services like Amazon and Netflix.
Gina Lollobrigida (1927-2023)
Lollobrigida came to cinema through fashion and Italian popular beauty pageants. Her relatively brief 25-year career included Italian social dramas and comedies (Bread, Love and Dreams; Frisky); big American productions shot in Europe (Trapeze, Solomon and Sheba) and European co-productions that involved prestigious talent that were better on paper than in execution (Fanfan, la Tulipe; Imperial Venus; Woman of Straw). The latter is certainly her best-known work, but the former is far more relevant and includes three superb films in which Lollobrigida delivers wonderfully energetic performances: Mario Monicelli and Steno’s A Dog’s Life (1950), a tragicomedy about a variety troupe’s pitiful existence; Pietro Germi’s Four Ways Out (1951), a crime story with social overtones and moral misery, set during a robbery of the ticket office at the old Fascist National Stadium amid a soccer match, which included Federico Fellini and Luigi Comencini among its screenwriters; and Luigi Zampa’s The Woman of Rome (1954) based on Alberto Moravia’s magnificent novel about the complicated life of a prostitute.
Anna Magnani (1908-1973)
Magnani is the eldest of…