The Rose-Tinted Fifties

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Despite its cinematic and intellectual influence, neo-realism only accounted for a fraction of the pictures made in postwar Italy. Moreover, the in-rush of movies that had been prescribed since 1938 ensured that Hollywood remained dominant at the box-office. Conscious of the need to boost local escapist production, the government offered a range of subsidies that were seized upon by unscrupulous purveyors of cheap quickies. But among the 1008 features made between 1945 and 1954, there were numerous melodramas and comedies that appealed to record audiences, if not always to the Catholics, Communists or critics.

Giuseppe De Santis's Riso Amaro (Bitter Rice) (1949) laced its realism with Silvana Mangano's sex appeal, while Pietro Germi's In Nome della Legge (In the Name of the Law) (1949) exploited clichés and stereotypes for political ends. Even more populist was the neo-realismo rosa of Raffaello Matarazzo's Catene (Chains) (1949), which starred Amedeo Nazarri and Yvonne Samson and was seen by one in eight Italians.

The dialect comedies of Macario and Totò also did brisk business, although they failed to emulate the international success of commedia all'Italiana hits like Luigi Comencini's Pane, Amore e Fantasia (Bread, Love and Dreams) (1953) and Mario Monicelli's I Soliti Ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street) (1958).

David Parkinson