Stromboli (1950)

Ingrid Bergman is "Karin" desperate to escape from post-war austerity, so she alights on the young Italian "Antonio" (Mario Vitale) and relocates to his somewhat barren home near the eponymous volcano. Once there, though, she struggles with the mundanity, the routine and the harshness of life in his village - one that is also suffering the lasting effects of the recently ended war, and is now largely devoid of any population. It turns out that her new husband isn't quite the catch she anticipated either - indeed he is somewhat of a brute. What can she do now? First thing I would say is make sure you watch the original version with subtitles (if you need them) - it adds so much more to the authenticity of this film, and oddly enough, that is really all the film has going for it. The pace here is just about as downbeat and pedestrian as the life she depicts on her island. It plods along without much headway before an ending that seemed to take much more than 90 minutes to get to. As you'd expect from Rossellini, the film has a certain class to it and the bleakness of the volcanic environment works well to create the mood for the film - it is just a fairly dialogue heavy one that isn't very cheery.