Analysis of Italian Neorealism Through Works of Michelangelo Antonioni

It can be seen that actually films produced in Fascist period did not have certain aesthetics which could define the goal of the film. These films did try to imply some goals, like, propaganda and entertainment, but these goals, contrary to Italian neorealist films, arguably did not deliver a clear message. Italian neorealists clearly were trying to portray reality through documenting particular issues, like, showing the poverty and desolation. For examples, in Vittorio de Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (1948) a father is struggling to financially support his family and to get a new bicycle in order to get a job, in Federico Fellini’s La Strada (1954) the main heroine Gelsomina is forced to join an itinerant entertainer as her poor mother sells her due to the family’s financial crisis and in Michelangelo Antonioni’s La Notte (1961) despair and depression of the main character, who’s friend is very ill, can be seen as she wonders around the city alone.

It can be seen that one of the main contributors to Italian neorealism is Michelangelo Antonioni, who not only enlarged the collection of Italian neorealism films, but also expanded its aesthetics with techniques that were diverse to other neorealist films. Although the goals of his films remained the same as other Italian neorealism films, it can be seen that there is something different about Antonioni’s art. …