There were many italian immigrants in France in the post-war years ;it began to decline in the mid-seventies ; French often called them names,notably "macaronis" and there were social tensions ,the "wops " being strike-breakers .
Just as it happens in the movie between compatriots ,between people from Sicily and those they met on the farm ,the people from northern Italy.
Pietro Germi's odyssey belongs to the Italian neo -realism and it has worn well,in spite of unfair critics , because the subplots are kept to economical levels: the Saro/Barbara /Vanni triangle which sometimes gets in the way ,is given small time in the whole movie.
The true hero is not Vallone but this little group , who leaves unemployement and poverty of their native island for the broader horizons of France , their promised land ;Vallone does not play the part of Mosis ,and it's better that way. This won't be a easy journey ,but a rocky road where they come against the carabinieri : their expatriation is illegal ;besides they are betrayed by their
smuggler ;and for their compatriots ,they are nothing but scabs.
And however it seems that at first ,on the farm ,a fraternity could exist : the Sicilian's guitar and the northern worker's accordion make everyone dance .These people who have given all they have for something new and unknown , show humanity (the bride's bouquet thrown on a mama's grave),solidarity ( they keep Barbara with them on the truck);sometimes they have to give up on their dreams,mainly the older ones ("I prefer to die where I was born") .
The ending has been blamed ,considered artificial happy end :but only a few of them were able to get to the border,and anyway,is it Heaven's gate (see what I wrote at the beginning of my comment)?But Pietro Germi wanted to leave his audience on a hopeful note : and anyway,whatever lays in store for them in France ,is it worse than their empty mines in Sicily ,where they nearly died :wasn't it some kind of hell?
