Christ Stopped At Eboli

Star Review

Carlo Levi's 1945 memoir ‘Cristo si e' fermato a Eboli’ chronicles the time spent by the author in exile in the South of Italy after his arrest for anti-fascist activity in his home town of Turin. Shortly after the book's publication, directors such as Rossellini, De Sica and Germi expressed strong interest in adapting the novel for the screen but their interest later cooled. It was director Francesco Rosi who completed the long-awaited film adaptation in 1979 with Gian Maria Volonté as Levi and Irene Papas as Giulia. The film unfolds as a meditative exploration of an urbane man of the north - an intellectual - adrift in the rugged, ancient landscapes of the south, and his attempts to make contact with both the people and the land of the mezzogiorno.
Given his southern Italian roots and his consistently sensitive exploration of the socio-political reality of the Italian South in films such as Salvatore Giuliano (1961) - which Carlo Levi himself had reviewed in glowing terms, praising it for its realism as well as its poetic sensibilities - Rosi had a strong affinity with Levi's memoir and proves an intelligent handler of the source material. Indeed, the film serves as a bridge between Rosi's acclaimed political thrillers of the 1970s and his more intimate, aesthetically accomplished films of the 1980s.
Beautifully photographed by regular Rosi (and Visconti) collaborator Pasquale De Santis, Rosi remains close to Levi's lucid, non-ideological and sympathetic description of the daily hardships experienced by the local peasants of Basilicata and features an excellent, typically distinguished central performance from Volonté.

Pasquale Iannone on 1st April 2006

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Film Description

Gian Maria Volonte gives a superbly-shaded performance as Carlo Levi, the Italian intellectual exiled in 1935 by the ruling fascist dictatorship to an isolated, poverty-stricken village in the South. Levi finds himself in a world little changed since the middle ages. The peasants scratch a meagre living from the land, and their wisdom, humanity and spirit helps Levi come to terms with his isolation.

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Winner of the BAFTA for Best Foreign Language Film, Rosi’s celebrated film tells the story of the life-changing exile of anti-Fascist intellectual Carlo Levi to a remo... more >

Winner of the BAFTA for Best Foreign Language Film, Rosi’s celebrated film tells the story of the life-changing exile of anti-Fascist intellectual Carlo Levi to a remote village in Southern Italy. The triumph of the human spirit is the theme of Rosi’s epic film, in which Carlo Levi is exiled in 1935 by the ruling Fascist dictatorship to a poverty-stricken village in the Basilicata region of southern Italy. Levi finds himself in a stark world, in which the peasants scratch a meagre living from the land, a world little changed since the Middle Ages. But, as Levi grapples with this new environment, it is the peasants’ wisdom, humanity and spirit that help him cope with his sense of helplessness and isolation. < less

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DVD Extras

• Italian portraits: Francesco Rosi.

Film Details

Cast

Gian-Maria Volonte, Irene Papas

Technical Details