This new digital restoration from Bologna's L'Immagine Ritrovata laboratory and Cinecittá Luce offers an overdue opportunity to reassess 'the strangest of all of Rossellini's films' (Peter von Bagh) and probably the least seen – so little, in fact, that it was once mythologised as a lost work, hidden amongst the director's canonical masterpieces. The film is a satirical fantasy, set in a small seaport south of Naples, and is about a photographer who discovers that his camera has magic powers: as he develops snapshots in his studio, their subjects expire in another part of the town, inspiring the cameraman to devise a scheme to kill the wicked, the greedy and the corrupt. An accompanying theme explores the post-WW2 Marshall Aid period in Italian history and 'the unholy alliance' between the liberating Americans and the Italians, 'whose familiar village farce,' as von Bagh describes it, 'is full of good stock characters: half-saints and half-wits, characters full of hate against the bureaucrats.' Rossellini called the film 'an isolated experiment', a showcase for his personal philosophy and humour. Does it work? This is a rare chance to find out.

Clyde Jeavons