Viaggio in Italia

The death of her uncles brings married couple Catherine and Alex to Naples in order that they might handle the sale of their inherited villa. From the first journey they make together, there is a real frost in the air and an apparent lack of love between them. After several difficult nights together where they acknowledge the tenuous state of their relationship and decide to use the holiday to spend time apart as opposed to being alone together. As Catherine heads off to catch up on the history and museums of the area while Alex idles around Capri, flirting and enjoying the friendly company of the young ladies he meets there.

It has been said that not a great deal happens in this film and those that say this are mostly correct – but they are not being critical of this fact, merely stating it. The basic plot is: couple comes to Italy with marriage problems and, in between fights, travel around the area – and that's about it in terms of definable action. However to simply leave it at that is to do this film a great injustice because so much of it is about more than just what is happening at any given moment and it is actually a beautifully shot and moving story of love within marriage. We join the story where Catherine and Alex (in a very well drawn marriage) have both come to the conclusion that their marriage must nearly be over. Neither really wants that but neither can manage to make things change; frustrated they go off and travel around Naples alone.

At this point the film balances two aspects with real skill. On one hand the film is a really intimate travel film, not just focusing on the sweeping scenery of the region but getting closer, looking at the specific histories, sites of interest and the people that reside there. Its strength is that it is never just about this because the scenery is just the backdrop for the two characters to discover themselves undergoing soul searching – but in a casual manner, not a heavy, gut wrenching fashion, more of a dawning realisation than anything else. This is subtly down and all the better for it; a convincing marriage that has been worn away to the point that the couple have simply forgotten to just be in love and instead have allowed other aspects of their relationship (the sarcasm, the niggling, the familiarity) to become the main part of their daily interactions. Those who have not been married or in a long-term relationship may not 'get' this film but I can assure you that it will likely be recognisable to you if you have been.

The chemistry between Sanders and Bergman is very convincing – I felt like there had been love between them but it had just been forgotten. Individually they both played their parts really well – there was no real 'eureka in the bathtub' moment until the end but, up till then, we had seen both the characters pick up little things along the way in a very able manner. The support cast were all good trimming round the edges but, in the version I saw, the dubbing into English was a little heavy at times and made it difficult to judge their performances. However the three stars here are all very good and drive the film without anybody else. Three stars? Sanders, Bergman and Naples itself.

Overall this is a slow film that has very little happening in it and, for that reason, it may frustrate some modern audiences who prefer their romantic dramas to have more spark and energy to it – however this is much more convincing for being subtle and elegant. The playing of Sanders and Bergman is pitch perfect and help keep our interest in their marriage alive, while the detail and sweep of Naples is well used as a suitable backdrop for them to rediscover their love against. If it were remade today it would be a massively different film, but this should be enjoyed for what it is – a great film that is of its time and should be enjoyed as such even if it requires at least a bit of patience.

This is the film that Truffaut writing for Cahiers proclaimed 'the first modern film', going on to praise Rossellini as the father of New Wave. If we don't want to be stridently literal about these things, I agree with him. A bunch of filmmakers who changed the face of cinema in the 60's are all connected to Rossellini and flow out from this film.

At the heart of it we have the familiar trope of a marriage falling apart, melodrama stuff. But modern, meaning understated and without the soaring emotion. We fill the gaps, providing our own understanding of how a relationship works. We participate as players.

So it's about this affair whose nothingness is revealed by the surrounding world, it withers away; the lavish villa with endless views of far horizon, the large, empty veranda where the two of them languish in comfortable lounge chairs. A little outside, it's the countryside of Naples that engulfs them with languid time and hot, lazy weather, a tabula rasa dotted with old ruins.

We're taken on a pilgrimage of these ruins, as the woman looking for a portent that will divine her predicament. The museum filled with statues, the old Roman fort, Vesuvius and Pompeii; Rossellini presents them as mute, ascetic images, images all pertaining to some austere representation into which the woman projects her own world coming to pass. None of them, of course, hold any answers, except as what they are - reminders of the perishable, impermanent world in which we try so hard to grow roots.

Meanwhile, back in Capri, the cynical husband is squandered in his own aimless voyage for something that will fill the time. He courts a woman, much like he did his wife perhaps all those years ago. He feigns and thrusts for desire. Finally he returns home with the same void gnawing inside. Passable stuff, as in La Notte some years later, but the important stuff is with the woman's journey; the Stromboli part of the film as it were.

It is all about the painful process by which ruins are made, time into memory. We are privy to one such enactment in ancient Pompeii (then still being excavated): into the hole once occupied by a dead body, that holds nothing now and is hollow except with shape, the archaeologists pour plaster in order to surmise the shape of that past. Yet what they retrieve is merely the replica of empty space.

Oh, there's the stupidly saccharine finale, no doubt imposed once again on Rossellini by his Italian distributors at Titanus. It's something to be on the lookout for, for how marvelously Rosssellini confounds his censors.

As the couple magically decide they finally love each other, the mob of peasants that surrounds them - participating in some local religious ceremony - cries out in jubilee about 'il miracolo!'. The two lovers are swept aside by people rushing to see, reunited in this nonsensical miracle. The final shot is of police offers looking stern as they inspect the scene, like the censors would the film. Whether or not we choose to accept the one miracle, boils down to whether or not we would the other.

I want to summarize Rossellini here; he's largely forgotten now - probably because when the cinema he envisioned finally took hold, he had already abandoned it. But he's one of the most important filmmakers we have known. You find out that so much of what eventually blossomed with film, grew first roots with him. His transcendent vision was exceptional.

The only misgiving - slight, very slight - is that everything is relatively precise with meaning. Empty space abounds here, the pure ascetic images, yet is mostly filled for us. We're left with simply unearthing the cast, reading the signs. Perhaps I'm saying this because he envisioned so far ahead that I'm comparing him in my mind with later filmmakers who abstracted deeper. No matter, Rossellini ushered cinema far enough.

Now it would be Antonioni's turn to shoulder it; he would supply the breathing, incomplete space into which the imagination can pour into. There is no cast that explains away with him, only the means of immersion into a space empty, waiting-to-be-filled with us (not by us). The ensuing voyage that finally brings us to The Passenger is one of the most fascinating that I know of, but that is covered elsewhere.

A masterwork. Heeding Martin Scorsese's advice during his documentary MY VOYAGE TO ITALY, I was finally able to see an English language version of this film on a Brazilian DVD release and the experience was an exhilarating one. The story of a couple on the verge of destruction, surrounded by the vestiges of Pompeii and a view of Vesuvius, is at once real and mesmerizing, and the captivating moment of truth presented in the finale is a stirring revelation. It's easy to see how this film pointed the way for the studied new wave romances to come, like Michelangelo Antonioni's L'AVVENTURA, Godard's CONTEMPT and even Stanley Donen's TWO FOR THE ROAD.

"Viaggio in Italia" is a unique experience, a beautiful work of art, and perhaps Rossellini's masterpiece, though I equally cherish GERMANY YEAR ZERO and FLOWERS OF ST. FRANCIS. It can best be viewed on the big screen in order to fully grasp its mysterious beauties. But, alas, it is not for every taste. The film was a commercial disaster when it opened. But those perceptive "Cahiers du Cinema" critics - Godard, Rivette, Rohmer, Truffaut - justly hailed it as a modern masterpiece and placed in their list of ten best films of all time. Ingrid Bergman and George Sanders are nothing short of brilliant as the feuding British couple who travel to Naples to close their holiday home. Rossellini's breathtaking documentary scenes in the Mediterranean background are perfectly melded with the fictional story of the couple and their state of mind. It all comes down to that final miraculous moment that no written words can describe. Subtle, mysterious and beautiful, "Viaggio" ranks with the finest works in cinema.

Viaggio in Italia (1954) was shown in the United States with the translated title Voyage to Italy. The movie was co-written and directed by Roberto Rossellini.

The film stars Ingrid Bergman as Katherine Joyce and George Sanders as Alex Joyce, her husband. They are both very British. (Sanders was British. Bergman couldn't handle the English accent.) They no longer love each other. They decide to go to Naples to try to salvage what's left of their marriage.

A marriage that's falling apart is a classic narrative. A trip to try to repair the damage is also classic. What's not classic is why anyone could believe that this marriage could be saved. Sanders tells Bergman that when he's alone with her he's bored. (Right.) He leaves Naples for a few days, and when he returns he picks up a prostitute rather than return to Bergman. He drives the prostitute to a park, and then takes home without touching her. (Right.) OK--it's 1954, but even so that's a weird scene.

The ending of the film is so bizarre that it defies description, so I won't describe it. Voyage to Italy is considered a Very Important Movie, and has a solid IMDB rating of 7.4. Maybe fellow raters saw something in the movie that I didn't see, or maybe they saw a different movie. I rated it 6, and that was a gift to honor Bergman's acting skills.