Film Review
If Roberto Rossellini's
Rome
Open City (1945) laid the foundation for the rebirth of Italian cinema in the
aftermath of World War II, Vittorio De Sica's
Sciuscià
(a.k.a.
Shoeshine) would provide it with
the impetus that would allow it to flourish in the following decades, establishing neo-realism
and redefining the role of director as that of auteur. Although
Sciuscià
had poor box office receipts in Italy, it was extraordinarily successful in other
countries, particularly the United States. The film was critically acclaimed, winning
several awards, including the first Oscar (at the 1947 Hollywood Academy Awards) to be
given to a foreign language film. Along with De Sica's other great films,
Ladri di biciclette (1948)
and
Umberto
D. (1952),
Sciuscià is now
regarded as a masterpiece of Italian neo-realism.
Sciuscià is one of a number of successful
collaborations between De Sica (who, at the time, was better known as a film actor) and
his screenwriter, Cesare Zavattini. They were inspired to make the film when they
learned about two boys, Scimmietta ('Little Monkey') and Cappellone ('Big Hat'), who made
a living by shining shoes. De Sica was keen to use non-professional actors in his
film and initially considered engaging the two boys to play the two lead parts, but then
decided against it because they were "ugly, almost deformed" (to use his words - even
neo-realism had its limits) The parts went to two unknown street children, Franco
Interlenghi (Pasquale, the older boy) and Rinaldo Smordoni (Giuseppe).
When filming
began, De Sica had another actor in mind for the part of Pasquale, and so shot the early
scenes in the film twice, once with each of the two budding actors, before deciding (with
some help from his friend Luchino Visconti) on Interlenghi. (The 'rejected' boy
appeared in the film as an extra.) After the film was released, both Smordoni and
Interlenghi enjoyed celebrity and were offered work in other films. However, whilst
Smordoni soon passed into obscurity (he ended up as a public transport worker), Interlenghi
had a successful, high-profile acting career for well over a decade.
The film's
Italian title
Sciuscià (pronounced "shu-sha")
is a Neopolitan corruption of the English word "shoeshine", and was the word shouted
out by boy shoe polishers to attract customers in Italy after WWII.
When the film
was awarded its Oscar, De Sica famously refused to attend the ceremony in America to receive
the award; apparently, he was reluctant to share the coveted trophy with his fellow screenwriters.
However, he later accepted the award at a special ceremony at the American Embassy in
Rome.
It is interesting to compare De Sica's approach with that of his neo-realist
contemporaries (Visconti, Rossellini, Pasolini, Antonioni). Whilst the subjects
of De Sica's films are often grim, set against the harsh realities of a ruined economy
- unemployment, poverty, homelessness - there is a softer edge to the realism than is
generally found in neo-realist cinema. This can be seen in the photography, which
is much more refined, more artistic (note the striking use of 'backlighting', for example),
far less crude, than in, say, the films of Rossellini, and which gives De Sica's films
a fairy tale feel.
Sciuscià
is a good example of this: De Sica uses this approach to emphasise the beauty of childhood
innocence in the film's gentle opening sequences. It takes a while before the brutality
of the adult world can crush this sense of childlike optimism, but when it does so, the
impact is just as heart-felt, if not more so, than in any other great neo-realist film.
Much of the power in De Sica's cinema derives from the way in which the director manages
to convey the strength and nobility of the human spirit, the capacity for hope and imagination,
in the grimmest, most squalid of situations. Of all the great neo-realist directors,
De Sica is arguably the one having the most profound sense of poetry and irony.
Another characteristic of De Sica is that he doesn't use his films to make condemnatory
statements about others; he's not interested in playing the 'blame game'. In his
films, his characters are victims not of other individuals' or society's evil acts, but
of a cruel combination of circumstances. The Second World War left Italy, like much
of continental Europe, in ruins, with a wrecked economy, mass unemployment, and streets
filled with homeless, parentless infants. In this social context, who could condemn
a child for acting as a black market go-between or a man for stealing to keep his family
from starving to death? The two “heroes” of
Sciuscià, Pasquale and
Giuseppe, are just two of the many millions struggling to stay alive and sustain their
dreams within a society that is bearly able to hold itself together. The film is
not about pointing the finger, but about observing the world around us. Even the
film's 'obvious' villains - the crooks that land the boys in prison, or the prison officers
(deceitful, violent, susceptible to bribery) are shown in a forgiving light, and not the
real cause of the tragedy that closes the narrative.
The film is far less preoccupied
with causes than with their effects. What happens to Pasquale and Giuseppe is an
inevitable consequence of the world in which they live. Had the circumstances between
more favourable, they would undoubtedly have gone on to lead happy and fulfilled lives,
but that would not have made a film worth seeing. With blistering humanity, the
film shows us how a seemingly eternal friendship can so easily be transformed into hatred.
It shows us how two people who love one another (to the extent that they cannot bear to
be separated) can end up destroying one another, just through a few almost inconsequential
quirks of fate. It is the tragic fragility of human relationships which is what
Sciuscià is about, nothing more, nothing less. This is what makes
it such a powerful piece of cinema and one that will continue to strike a chord with
future generations of those who watch it. Whilst human beings walk the face of the
Earth, Vittorio De Sica's parable-like
Sciuscià will continue to have an
impact.
© James Travers 2006
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Next Vittorio De Sica film:
Ladri di biciclette (1948)