L'Amore in Citta DVD, 1953

The brainchild of critic and scriptwriter Cesare Zavattini, Love in the City was meant to be the first in a series of cine-magazines – not a newsreel, not a fiction feature, but a medley of items taken from, or recreating, life as it is lived. But it failed to find a niche at the box office and has been consigned to a footnote in the history books. This is a pity. Its mixture of fiction and documentary and especially its use of voice-to-camera, prefiguring cinéma vérité, was absolutely novel. If it failed it was because it was ahead of its time and what the film-makers wanted to do could not be done without the lightweight technology which made cinéma vérité possible in the 1960s. Some episodes are weaker than others. But Fellini’s (fictional) story about a marriage bureau is utterly charming. Carlo Lizzani’s sober and sympathetic interviews with prostitutes are groundbreaking. And Antonioni’s similar and yet magically different interviews with young women who had attempted suicide – well, the collection is worth it for this episode alone.

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