Summary
In her forties, Mamma Roma decides to make a break with the past. She moves to another
part of her town, with her adolescent son Ettore, and exchanges her life as a prostitute
for that of a market trader. Despite her best efforts, Mamma Roma in unable to make
a better life for herself or her son. Whilst she is forced back into prostitution,
to make money to pay off a former lover, Ettore becomes mixed up with a gang of youths
who turn him into a criminal…
Review
Mamma Roma, Pasolini’s second and perhaps most important film, shows some marked
similarities with his first, Accattone (1961). Both are keenly observed and
intensely poignant portraits of Italian poor people trapped in a life from which there
is no escape, filmed using a starkly neo-realist yet alluring style of cinematography.
Post-war Italian film icon Anna Magnani stars as the tragically framed lead character,
Mamma Roma, giving a characteristically gripping performance, full of emotional power
yet totally believable. Thanks to her contribution, the film leaves a lasting impression
on the spectator, in spite of (or perhaps because of) the simplicity of the narrative
and the harsh melodramatic ending.
© James Travers 2002
For World Cinema on DVD...
See also:
Best Italian Films
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