After filming stories about the resistance of the Italian people during the Fascist and Nazi regimes, and the story of a German child against the barren landscape of Berlin after the war, Roberto Rossellini made a movie about Francis of Assisi and started a love and work relationship with actress Ingrid Bergman. In his evolution to works like 'The Rise To Power of Louis XIV', he made a series of melodramas with Bergman, of which 'Stromboli' and 'Voyage To Italy' are always considered the most important. Add to that list this fine drama, in which bourgeois housewife Irene suffers a transformation when confronted with the misery of those who had not been benefited with the European 'economic miracle.' Considered a saint by those she helped (Giulietta Masina included), Rossellini makes quite obvious that Irene reached that state by detouring from the usual roads she took as the wife of a prominent industrialist (Alexander Knox.) Not only has she a Marxist cousin who curiously does not preach his philosophy, but gives Irene advise whenever she talks about the misery she is discovering- but she also ventures into the slums, helps a single mother, a prostitute and a thief. The final section of the movie reminded me of 'María de mi corazón', a latter film written by Gabriel García Márquez, based on a real story. As in 'María
' there is neither opportunity nor chance to explain clearly what she's going through to husband or authorities, leading her to a dead end of desperation. Only sainthood will save her from the dehumanization around her.
Review of Europe '51
