La terra trema

It's hard to believe that I am the first person to comment on this masterpiece at this website. One reason could be that it's not that easy to see. Thank God for Turner Classic Movies, which is where I finally saw it. I'm happy to see that there's a DVD available.

This is one of those amazing films that uses only non-professionals and in which they perform as well, if not better, than any professional could. The actors are the inhabitants of a small Sicilian fishing village. The film is cliche-ridden (the Marxist variety) and at times predictable. I didn't care about any of this. The film is a true epic about a few people trying to break out of their rut of exploitation and the wretchedness of their everyday living, and failing. The film thus achieves the status of true tragedy. This one shouldn't be missed.

Although it was supposed to be a documentary, Visconti put in a slight story line to achieve what a documentary would have done, AND MORE. --He used no professional actors, just native Sicilian fishermen, and other villagers, to play all parts. -- The film uses no artificial lighting, no sound enhancement, sound-effects, or dubbing. -- It was filmed on location in, and around, the crumbling homes of the poor villagers, and it was recorded in the Sicilian dialect (rather than proper Italian), and although it has a documentary "look", Visconti shows the exploitation of the poor by the capitalist middlemen so much more effectively than any documentary could have done.

-- Also, while not the first neo-realist film of that post-war Italian genre, this was the first film to be described by the term: "neo-realist". --A brilliant film on all counts. I rated it "10".

This moving slice of life has several acts and moves like an opera, but the scenes are "neo-realistic" in the best sense.

All of Visconti's actors are from the Sicilian fishing village, but they were not acting--just portraying their lives. You care about these real people!

Family is everything--and it survives despite the buffeting by the storms, the stranglehold of the oligarchical wholesalers, and shortsightedness of the townspeople. We see the exploitation of the fishermen vividly and how most accept it as "God's will."

It also brings to mind the old joke: What is the difference between capitalism and communism? Capitalism is the exploitation of man by man, and communism is just the reverse.

In 1947, in Sicily near Catania, the fishermen in Aci Trezza have been exploited by generations by the local middlemen. The young 'Ntoni Valastro rebels against the economical situation of his poor family and convinces the Valastro to mortgage their simple house in the Fidania Bank in Catania to buy a fish boat of their own and never work again for the wholesalers. In a stormy day, he decides to fish due to the necessity of repaying the debt to the bank; however, the storm destroys his boat and the dream of his family. Without any support and job, 'Ntoni sees the disintegration of his outcast family.

"La Terra Trema: Episodio del Mare" is a heartbreaking, bitter and cruel story of a family of fishermen that decides to change their poor economical situation facing the powerful exploiters. The Marxist "Red Count" Luchino Visconti directs and narrates this little masterpiece of the Italian Neo-Realism casting non-professional actors and actresses, actually fishermen and inhabitants of Aci Trezza. The abusive treatment of the greedy and idle wholesalers gives an idea of how workers were exploited in this period of history and the reason for the ideological fight of classes between Communism and Capitalism. In Brazil, this film was released on DVD by Versátil Distributor. My vote is nine.

Title (Brazil): "A Terra Treme" ("The Earth Shakes")

A Marxist aristocrat, Count Don Luchino Visconti Di Morone was widely praised for both the realism and vaguely politicized tone of his early films, and the operatic sumptuousness of his later historical costume dramas... Throughout his career, however, style dominated content; all too often, the result was camp, decorative melodrama disguised as solemn, socially significant art...

"La Terra Trema," an epic account of the hardship suffered by Sicilian fishermen, was even closer to Neo-realism, shot on location with a cast of nonprofessional actors living their lives on screen... Its somewhat simplistic Marxist message, that the peasants' real enemy was not Nature but exploitive businessmen, was in fact less indicative of Visconti's future and its use of a disintegrating family to mirror the social climate of Italy as a whole...

The conflicts, misery, poverty, joy, and anger in a fishing village are shown in a panoramic study of man and earth...

'The Earth will Tremble' is not political nor intends to teach... The film reveals... it doesn't judge...

The cinematography is outstanding, particularly the scenes with the fishermen at sea...