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Summary
In a poor district on the outskirts of Rome, a middle-aged woman, Cabiria, earns a living
as a prostitute. She has fared better than most: she has her own house (a modest
stone-walled shack) and a good income. When her boyfriend pushes her into the river
before running off with her handbag, she picks herself up and carries on with her life
as if nothing has happened. One evening, she runs into a famous film star who takes
her back to his luxurious apartment – only to face another humiliation when the actor’s
girlfriend appears unexpectedly. Having been moved by a solitary man’s efforts
to help the poor, Cabiria joins a pilgrimage to a holy shrine. The experience gives
her hope that she can change for the better, unlike her prostitute friends. Later,
at a show, a hypnotist invites her onto the stage, where she is put into a trance and
forced to reveal her private life. Her story moves one member of the audience, Oscar,
an accountant, who introduces himself to Cabiria after the show. Initially suspicious
about Oscar’s motives, Cabiria agrees to meet him again. She soon convinces herself
that he is the man who can take her away from her life of prostitution and solitude.
At last, she is happy…
Review
Whilst overshadowed by Fellini’s subsequent cinematic masterpieces, Le Notti di Cabiria
deserves to be considered one of the director’s best works, a poignant examination
of the fallibility and resilience of the human spirit. An intensely moving film,
it shows the futility of blind faith – in religion, chance and people – whilst, at the
same time, reminding us that life, whatever hardships Fate throws in our way, is something
to be treasured. It is not intentionally a religious film but it portrays the strength
of the human spirit, to endure and overcome devastating personal crises, in a way that
makes it a parable of modern life, and watching the film does prove to be something of
a spiritual experience.
With its gritty portrayal of the life of prostitutes and the poor, Le Notti di Cabiria
is more representative of Fellini’s neo-realist origins than his later era of grand,
stylised, dramatic satires – although, historically and technically, the film marks the
transition between these two stages in the director’s career. Because this film
fell into comparative obscurity within a few years of its release, Fellini was able to
re-use a lot of its material in his later films, notably La
Dolce vita (1960).
One of the most moving sequences in Le Notti di Cabiria shows a taciturn man distributing
food to poor people in the barren countryside outside Rome. The scene is important
since it provides the impetus for Cabiria’s spiritual transformation, but it has only
recently been restored to the film. Before the film was released in 1957, the Catholic
Church insisted this sequence, which runs to about seven minutes, be cut, because it implied
the Church was failing in its duty to care for the poor. Another sequence,
which is both deeply moving and overtly mocking, is where Cabiria joins a pilgrimage to
a holy shrine. Amongst a throng of pilgrims imploring their Santa Maria to forgive
them and cure their ailments, only Cabiria appears genuinely to believe in the power of
redemption. And, immediately after the ceremony, the only person who appears to
have been marked by it – for better or for worse – is Cabiria. In a more tolerant
era, it is easy to see how this “parable” fits within the Christian message of the Gospel.
At the time, when the Catholic Church was constantly on its guard, it must have been enormously
controversial, to say the least.
In many ways, Le Notti di Cabiria is one of Fellini’s least ambitious films.
It is essentially concerned with a single theme: one person’s spiritual journey.
Before our eyes, we see a thick-skinned, rather ignoble prostitute who has no control
over her life, undergo a slow but sure transformation. She may not achieve her long
wished for dreams, but where she ends up is far better than where she started – and she
has the potential to move on and create for herself the life she had hoped for.
It is a subtle yet profoundly moving work, made all the more effective because Fellini
does not employ the clever cinematic devices he uses so well in his later films.
The narrative structure is simple, the cinematography is restrained, yet the story he
tells is intrinsically so powerful that the film stands as one of his greatest works.
The part of Cabiria is played by Fellini’s wife, Giulietta Masina, and it is impossible
to imagine a better portrayal of the waif-like prostitute. Often described as the
female equivalent of Chaplin’s loveable tramp, Masina’s Cabiria is plausibly the most
touching and most believable creation in Fellini’s entire oeuvre. Initially
in the film, Masina plays the part almost for laughs alone, and certainly her performance
in the first third of the film is wondrously comical. But then, little by little,
Masina reveals something of the true Cabiria, someone who has never experienced love and
who, despite her protestations to the contrary, is a rather sentimental character.
As we follow Cabiria on her journey of self-discovery, we grow to love her, and the experiences
she endures at the end of the film – tragic, but not entirely so – are something we can
easily sympathise with. Can the clown’s teardrop which Cabiria acquires in
the film’s final sequence be a sign that her spiritual transformation is complete?
Now that she is consciously aware of the comedy in her life’s drama, she can start to
live, free of the fears and false hopes that have previously made her life a meaningless
act. Without any doubt, the film’s impact owes as much to Masina’s performance as
to Fellini’s direction.
Le Notti di Cabiria won the best foreign film Oscar in 1957 and Giulietta Masina
won the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival in the same year. A decade
later, the film was remade as a glitzy stage musical and film “Sweet Charity” (with Shirley
MacLaine playing the lead role).
© James Travers 2004
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See also:
Best Italian Films
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