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La Strada

“La Strada” (1954, Italian) Director: Federico Fellini

Review

To be honest, I wasn’t sure if I was going to like this movie based on reading a synopsis of it online, but I ended up loving it and am thoroughly glad I watched it.

The film stars Giulietta Masina as Gelsomina, a, shall we say, “unsophisticated” young woman who is literally bought by travelling strongman Zampano (Anthony Quinn) one day from her mother (did things like this actually happen in 1950’s Italy?) to be taken on the road with him across the Italian countryside as his assistant in his (rather unspectacular) Strongman show. We learn right away that his former assistant, Rosa, who was Gelsomina’s sister, has died, but we don’t find out how. Well, Zampano turns out to be – you guessed it – an abusive, brutish a-hole of a guy who treats Gelsomina…poorly, to put it mildly. It’s seemingly implied that he forces himself on her early on, then takes every opportunity he can to cheat on her after they’re ostensibly married.

This may seem like a bummer of a storyline, but the performances by Masina and Quinn (and later Richard Basehart as The Fool, who inexplicably teases and taunts Zampano at every opportunity he gets, despite being half his size) are so stellar that you soon become entranced in its odd quirkiness and unique style. The performances, especially the two leads, are so good that they would be Oscar-worthy if given today – Giulietta Masina, in particular, has a face that seems to be in a perpetual state of either joy or despair at any given moment, like an over-emotional circus clown.

Favorite scene: Gelsomina breaking down, having run away from Zampano, defeated and emotional, declaring, “I’m sick of living…why was I born?”, yet carrying on despite her tribulations. Lines like this, along with the theme of “everything in this world has a purpose”, the phenomenal acting, and the unexpected ending, make La Strada a classic well worth your time.