Annie Girardot e Alain Delon on the roof of the Duomo |
Luchino Visconti's sprawling saga (surely an influence on The Godfather): fate uproots and urbanizes a peasant mother and her five sons, most of whom go to hell in a handbasket in the big city.
The Milanese aristocratic director watches his city with the eyes of immigrants.
Photography by Giuseppe Rotunno and music score by Nino Rota are part of this masterpiece and deserve to be mentioned.
Milano: in the mythical '60s, Milano was just hitting her stride. Burgeoning industry in the North brought wave after wave of economic refugees from the farms and villages of Italy's southern regions. The living conditions of these migrants, their hopes and despairs provided the central theme for Luchino Visconti's films.
Today, Milano is the economic capital of Italy, seat of the main stock exchange (Piazza Affari) and the supreme catwalk of international fashion. The heart of the city is, as ever, composed of the Piazza del Duomo, and the surrounding streets which make up one of Europe's largest pedestrian zones lined with banks, shops, cinemas and department stores. When "Rocco and his Brothers" was filmed, trams and cars stills whizzed through the area. |
Piazza del Duomo today |
|
