Rocco e i suoi fratelli (1960) Reviews

• Visconti's masterpiece

  irajoel2001-04-02

  This primo example of Italian neo-realism directed by Luchino Visconti is one of those films that people either love or hate, there really is no in between when it comes to this film. I think it magnificent, and I've seen it 3 or 4 times. The last viewing was last fall at the Film Forum in New York City, and once again I was knocked out by it. The plot is simple, a poor family headed by the mother moves to the big city to try to make a better life for her and her sons. Katina Paxinou plays the mama mia in a larger than life performance that at times knocks you out of your seat. The film is divided into sections with each one devoted to one of the brothers, but the thrust (and heart) of the narrative concerns two of the brothers, Rocco played by a never better nor more beautiful Alain Delon & his intense love-hate relationship with his brother played by Renato Salvatori who also gives a superb performance. The other great performance in the film is from Annie Girardot as a prostitute with a semi-heart of gold. Girardot first has a vivid & difficult relationship with Salvatori who is a brutal & simple prize fighter, but then she drops him, when she falls in love with Delon. Needless to say trouble and high operatic drama follows that finally ends in tragedy that never fails to leave me in tears. Both soapy & operatic, this is one of the great films of the 60's & one of Visconti's best. Also look for a young Claudia Cardinale in an early film role.

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• WOW! Terrific Epic Scale Family Drama, Visconti's Best!

  antonio-212000-09-07

  Now I understand why Visconti regards this classic as his personal favorite!! Overwhelmingly Terrific! The acting, design, music, cinematography, and especially direction are superb. This epic, grand, personal, and highly dramatic tale of five brothers and their mother who move from Southern Italy to Milan to change their station in life is filled with wonderful vignettes and powerful set pieces. The fight between two of the brothers in the slums of the city is one of the most harrowing and touching scenes ever in cinema history. This is the kind of fight which actually means something. When they hit each other you feel it down to the core of your being, not just watching mindless brutality like you would in some brainless movie. The cast is uniformly good with standouts from Katina Paxinou as the long suffering mother, Annie Girardot as the doomed prostitute who is the catalyst of the story, and especially Alain Delon who is blessed with a cinematic beauty which adds poetry to everyone of his close-ups. The one actor who really surprised me was Renato Salvatori as the violent brother Simone. His gradual and completely believable change from sweet young man to violent brute is incredible to watch. This film satisfies every true movie lovers dream. To visit a place you don't know, with characters who fascinate you, and are framed in a true CINEMATIC style, that succeeds on every level. GO SEE THIS MOVIE!! I will add my voice to those who cry out for the DVD release of this true classic.

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• A GREAT FILM from ITALY (1960)

  olddiscs2002-02-23

  This is a great Italian film directed by Visconti, which somehow escaped me until tonite 2/22/02.. I had heard about it and the praise it received at that time, (1960) but just never got to see it. I was seeing Foreign films at that time, I remember seeing La Dolce Vita, The Virgin Spring, and Hiroshima Mon Amour at our local foreign movie theatre in Essex County , The Ormont in East Orange.. long gone.. but missed this. Well, thanks to TCM, Ive had another sleepless night & have just seen a truly great Italian movie/ or great movie, period!!..What a saga ! what passion, what emotion !! The story of a southern Italian peasant family's journey and relocation to the big city... is just superb film making..The deterioration of the brothers relationship is almost pure GreeK Tragedy (there is a glimmer of hope with the youngest brother)...superbly acted especially by Renato Salvatori, as Simon, the most troubled of all the fratelli, and young, beautiful, Alain Delon as the younger brother Rocco who desperately tries to save his brother from destruction; and Annie Giradot, as Nadia the prostitute who adds to this families woes is just sensational in a role that should have won her all kinds of trophies. It was no mistake that Visconti used Greek Oscar winning actress, Katina Paxinou, in the role of an Italian mother( instead of say, Anna Magnani ?), her performance brings to mind all the heroines of Sophocles & Aesculus... yes tragedy and emotion of epic proportions..played to the nth degree... beautiful cast excellently directed... by Viscont1... thanks to TCM Im catching up on his great movies "SENSO" a few months back and now "Rocco" this is a treat.. also in cast a very young beautiful Claudia Cardinale as Ginetta.. This is film making at its best..dont miss it.. to be seen again and again..

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• Renato Salvatori shines in Visconti's masterpiece

  braugen2003-04-02

  The Italian master Luchino Visconti's 1960 (melo)drama "Rocco e i Suoi Fratelli" is the best film I've seen in a long, long time, and it deserves to be up there among European cinema's finest achievements, along with Visconti's other masterpiece, "Il Gattopardo" (1963). Aristocrat turned communist, Visconti draws a beautiful, but horrible picture of Milan in the 1960s, when the "immigration" from the South was at its peek, and the social problems in Northern Italy exploded. The differences between north and south in Italy are enormous, and were perhaps even greater back when Visconti and his scriptwriting crew decided to make a contemporary film about a family moving northwards. Visconti wanted to make a film about a mother and her five sons, like the five fingers on her hand, like the mother herself exclaimes at the end of the film. This is not an agitational film, though, just a superbly acted study of a society in disorder and a portrait of a family trying to make ends meet in a harsh world they do not know. Like another Italian director, Pier Paolo Pasolini, noted, the South of Italy stayed an undeveloped land even after the North became industrialized, and that didn't happen before after WWII. This is the grim truth, and the person who thought this film was depressing should just stay on his or her pills and turn his or her eyes towards the real world, because the world IS a depressing place. You just cannot blame directors with a social conscience for trying to tell a story which lies close to their hearts, then you should stay away from film criticism and criticize the world instead. I am so tired of that. Renato Salvatori makes a performance of a lifetime as the troubled brother Simone, while Alain Delon stays calm and controlled as Rocco, the protagonist, if there is one. Boxing is used as a metaphor for the anger the young men feel, but when Simone fails, Rocco succeeds by fueling his fighting with the contempt for his brother's actions. The two brothers are torn between the beautiful prostitute Nadia, whom they both love passionately, but she only loves Rocco- and that almost breaks the family. The other brothers are more supporting characters, and even though the film is long it should have been even longer- the second youngest brother, Ciro, is an interesting and morally strong character that I would have loved to see developed further. The pride, ignorance, hatred, loyalty and love of these people are held together by a perfect script by Visconti and his four collaborators, and cinema's finest cinematographer, Guiseppe Rotunno, moves his camera magnificently through the streets, houses, and locales of a growing, but morally decaying Milan. This is cinematic perfection.

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• An astonishing work of almost religious intensity

  YouRebelScum2003-04-22

  I was lucky enough to catch this extraordinary film late last night on a cable channel. It's about a widow from southern Italy who moves to Milan with her five sons. Gradually they become embroiled in the big city, some becoming corrupted by its ways, others profiting. Rocco, played by Alain Delon, is an innocent, looking at his brothers and life in general with saintly patience. When his beneficent attitude comes under pressure, he doesn't give in to self-interest, choosing to sacrifice his own happiness, and that of the woman he loves, for his family. Family is really what 'Rocco and his Brothers' is all about. I've never got into Visconti, but seeing this film has made me want to see more of his work. Also, this move has one of the most powerful images I've ever seen, as the maddened Simone advances towards the doomed prostitute Nadia. It's an image so remarkable I actually shouted aloud when I saw it. I urge you to see this film. It's a remarkable, passionate, beautifully photographed drama that will stay with you for a long time.

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