Country: Italy
Year: 1952
Duration: 97'
The story of three girls from the Roman suburbs who work in a
dressmaker's shop in piazza di Spagna. Marisa is engaged to a factory
worker, who threatens to leave her when she begins to work as a model,
but then makes up with her. Elena is engaged to an office worker, but
she is so distraught when she discovers he is only after her money that
she attempts suicide. The love of an honest chauffeur will save her from
her desperation. Lucia, who is rather short and is only attracted to
tall men, ignores the attentions of a humble jockey, but in the end she
is won over by his persistence and marries him. "I'm not prone to
looking for extraordinary facts […] that shed light on the humanity of
certain characters: I am interested in their daily life, with all the
sad and happy, trivial and terrible things that can happen to them." (L.
Emmer)
Biography
film director
Luciano Emmer
Luciano Emmer was born in Milan on January 19, 1918. He became interested in cinema during his student days and made short 16mm films. In 1938, after finishing secondary school, he moved to Rome with his friend and collaborator Enrico Gras, with whom he founded a production house and made innovative and important documentaries about the works of famous artists of the past like Giotto, Bosch, Carpaccio, Piero della Francesca and Goya. He was exiled to Switzerland during the war, and when he returned to Italy he ended his collaboration with Gras, who had made roughly twenty films between 1938 and 1948. In 1950, Emmer debuted in narrative cinema with Domenica d'agosto, a neorealist comedy, followed by a long series of portraits of Italian lower-middle-class society, which he made with the screenwriter and producer Sergio Amidei. He also collaborated with writers like Pratolini and Flaiano, making Parigi è sempre Parigi (1951), Le ragazze di piazza di Spagna (1952), Terza liceo (1953) e Camilla (1954), all based on stories about normal people and daily events. Without ever abandoning documentaries (Gli eroi dell'Artide was made in 1954), after his comedies Il Bigamo (1956) and Il Momento più bello (1957) he moved on to the world of Carosello, becoming one of their key exponents. In 1961, he returned to cinema with the semi-documentary film La Ragazza in vetrina, which he shot in Holland, but he then abandoned cinema once again and dedicated himself completely to television. During the 1960's and 70's, Emmer shot clips for Carosello, reports, and television series (Geminus, 1969, with Walter Chiari, and K2 + 1, 1970, with the Kessler twins and Johnny Dorelli). He also began filming art again, from the documentary series Io e… (1972) and La terra dei naïfs jugoslavi (1979), all the way to his most recent documentary, I magici colori di Napoli (2004). In 1990, after an almost thirty-year hiatus, he returned to cinema with Basta! Ci faccio un film, which he wrote with his son David and which was presented in Venice. Over the next decade he made two full-length fiction films, Una lunga, lunga, lunga notte d'amore (2001) and L'acqua… il fuoco(2003)which was also selected as a non-competing film in Venice.
FILMOGRAFIA
Racconto da un affresco (cm, doc, 1938), Paradiso terrestre (cm, doc, 1939), La sua terra (cm, doc, 1941), Il cantico delle creature (cm, doc, 1941), Destino d'amore ovvero Piccolo mondo al platino (cm, doc, 1941), Romanzo di un'epoca (cm, doc, 1942), Guerrieri (cm, doc, 1943), La città ha sete (cm, doc, 1943), Bianchi pascoli (cm, doc, 1947), Sulle orme di Verdi (cm, doc, 1947), Terra del melodramma (cm, doc, 1947), Sulla via di Damasco (cm, doc, 1947), Romantici a Venezia/Venise et ses amants (cm, doc, 1948), Isole nella laguna (cm, doc, 1948), La leggenda di Sant'Orsola/La légende de Sainte Ursule (cm, doc, 1948), L'invenzione della croce (cm, doc, 1948), I fratelli miracolosi (cm, doc, 1948), L'allegoria della Primavera (cm, doc, 1948), Il miracolo di san Gennaro (cm, doc, 1948), La Colonna Traiana (cm, doc, 1948), Domenica d'agosto (1950), Goya - I disastri della guerra e La festa di Sant'Isidoro (cm, doc, 1950), Parigi è sempre Parigi (1951), Le ragazze di piazza di Spagna (1952), Leonardo da Vinci (mm, doc, 1952), Cavalcata di mezzo secolo (co-regia Walter Raveroni, doc, 1952), La carriera di un libertino - Matrimonio alla moda e La carriera di una cortigiana (cm, doc, 1953), Picasso (mm, 1953), Eroi dell'Artide (mm, doc, 1954), Terza liceo (1954), Camilla (1954), Il bigamo (1955), Il momento più bello (1957), Caroselli (TV, 1957-1976), Paradiso terrestre (doc, 1957), Io, la Vespa (cm, doc, 1959), Necchi (cm, 1960), La ragazza in vetrina (1961), Bianco rosso e celeste. Cronaca dei giorni del Palio di Siena (doc, TV, 1962), Noi e l'automobile (doc, TV, 1962), «Documentari turistici per l'ENIT» - Bologna-Firenze km 84,700; Blue and Green; Ein Traum is eine Stadt (Un sogno è una città); Confidenzialmente Roma; Cronaca di un viaggio; In pieno sole; Azzurro e verde (doc, 1964), La distrazione (doc, mm, TV, 1965), Foggia… non dirle mai addio (mm, doc, 1966), La sublime fatica (cm, doc, 1966), Il libro dell'arte (1967), Geminus (TV, 1969), K2 + 1 (TV, 1971), Io e… (doc, TV, 1972), Furia (TV, 1974), Aimez-Vous l'italie? (doc, TV, 1976), Carosello che passione! (TV, 1978), La terra dei naïfs jugoslavi (mm, doc, TV, 1979), «Chimica e agricoltura» - Fertilizzanti I e II; Fitoregolatori; Fitoregolatori-nematocidi; Nematocidi; Insetticidi I e II; Lotta biologica; Lotta integrata; Fungicidi; Diserbanti; Materie plastiche I e II (doc, TV, 1984), «Documentari scientifici per l'ENEA» - Acquicoltura; Energia nuova per l'agricoltura; Un insetticida che non inquina; Fertilità biologica e fertilizzazione organica (doc, 1984), La bellezza del diavolo. Viaggio nei castelli trentini (mm, doc, TV, 1989), Basta! Ci faccio un film (1990), Cinema Italia (co-regia enrico ghezzi, cm, doc, 1990), Cinema Europa (co-regia enrico ghezzi, cm, doc, 1990), L'orso della Val di Non (cm, 1990), Il dramma di Cristo narrato da Giotto (cm, doc, 1992), Bella di notte (cm, doc, 1997), La bella addormentata (cm, doc, 1999), Una lunga, lunga, lunga notte d'amore (2001), Incontrare Picasso (mm, doc, 2000), L'istantanea (cm, doc, 2000), Ore 9: lezione di cinema (cm, doc, 2000), Nostalgie (cm, doc, 2001), L'acqua… il fuoco (2003), Con aura… Senz'aura. Viaggio ai confini dell'arte (co-regia enrico ghezzi, mm, doc, 2003), I magici colori di Napoli (cm, doc, 2004).