can i suggest we move along to LA STRADA on monday...

I have already said that I identify neorealism primarily with Roberto Rossellini. The other father of neorealism was Cesare Zavattini. He is a poet, a copious source of ideas, invention and new perspectives. The collaboration between Zavattini and Vittorio De Sica yielded much fruit: Sciuscia, Bicycle Thieves, Umberto D., Miracle in Milan. If I remember correctly, Miracle in Milan appeared in the same year as Rossellini's The Flowers of Saint Francis, which represented a decisive stage in the development of neorealism.

Up until then the movement had been a spontaneous impulse to view reality with disenchanted and liberated eyes, a way of taking stock of the contemporary world. Now what was needed was knowledge of humanity, by turning those same eyes upon the inner man. The Flowers of Saint Francis was step in this direction, leading the way for Rossellini's later films, culminated with General Della Rovere. Neorealism pretended to derive directly from life, but life transforms itself incessantly. Rossellini had the sensitivity always to keep in tune with the shiting wavelength of real life, even it if meant contradicting his theoretical principles. But neorealism was exploited somewhat excessively, even for purely commenrcial reasons. If there hadn't been this exploitation, we would all call ourselves neorealists today.

this is from a few days back, but hey, i've only gotten here.

lady wakasa, bordwell (and thompson) have two major books: film art (more like a film dictionary) and film history. while nice, they're too much of the textbook variety to sit back and enjoy. instead, i'd recommend the oxford history of world cinema (ed. nowell-smith) for essays that combine history and some theory, and oxford guide to film studies (ed.s hill and church-gibson) for an overview of pretty much all film theory. it'll give you a more general idea, so then you can go out and read the more specific theory texts, which usually come in handy collections like film theory and criticism (ed.s mast, cohen, braudy), film theory (ed.s stam and miller) or movies and methods (vol. 1-2, ed. nichols). hope that helps.

i'm back. or at least i'll try to be, since fellini's one of my all-time favorites.

Those guys [are] too damn old to be screwing around doing nothing. I am sure this was not unusual for the times, but for whatever reason, it detracted from the film for me.