14th August 1943, and Rome is declared an ‘open city’, allowing the German occupiers to inhabit the city on the understanding the ancient capital’s architectural and art treasures are preserved, and allowing a certain amount of freedom for the native Romans. Having managed to escape from the Gestapo, resistance leader Giorgio Manfredi, a former engineer, flees across the rooftops, and seeks somewhere to hide with the help of his close friend Francesco, his pregnant fiancée Pina and Don Pietro Pellegrini, the priest who was due to marry them, but finding a place of safety from the Nazis for the wanted Giorgio has become a priority. Having made friends with Pina’s sister, Giorgio’s ex-girlfriend Marina Mari finds out where he is, and betrays him and his fellow resistance members to the Gestapo in exchange for illicit drugs, a fur coat, and other hard to find luxury goods. As Francesco helps an Austrian defector and Giorgio to get out of the city, they are seized by Major Bergmann, the Gestapo commander, and the local Police commissioner. As they are being put into the back of a truck, Pina sees Francesco and runs after the vehicle, causing the soldiers within to gun her down in the street. Taken to the Gestapo headquarters, Giorgio is ruthlessly tortured, and is told that the attempted defector has hanged himself in his cell. The Nazis try to force the priest to admit his connection to the resistance cause, forcing him to watch Giorgio’s torture when he refuses to crack. The next morning Don Pietro is taken into the courtyard for execution, trying to carry it out before his own parish hears of his arrest the night before and can organise any sort of protest, but parish altar boys show up to where Don Pietro is facing the firing squad, and begin whistling a hymn which Don Pietro recognizes. The firing squad, made up of Italian civilians, aim their weapons, and prepare to pull the triggers. Directed by Roberto Rossellini, the Italian director who was one of the leading lights in the neo-realist movement, spearheading a form of cinema which in more recent years has sometimes been termed ‘drama-documentary’, Rome, Open City, made in 1945, just months after the end of the war, is very much based on real events, as in the event of the imminent seizure of a city in wartime, the government of the country that controls the city will sometimes declare it an ‘open city’, declaring that they have abandoned all defensive efforts, expecting the enemy forces not to bombard or attack, but simply to march in, the declaration often being made in order not only to protect the population but also to protect historic landmarks and buildings, as happened with Rome in August 1943, and earlier in Paris, Brussels and Oslo in 1940. Rossellini’s film has the immediacy of the events it depicts, being shot on the streets of Rome on what would largely be called a ‘guerilla’ style, he and his crew often stopping just long enough to set up and shoot quickly on the actual locations, not bothering to have areas taped off or isolated, and the feeling of realism is extremely powerful. His resources at the time were extremely limited, and thus influenced his approach, using mostly natural lighting, mostly non-professional actors and little in the way of camera trickery or particularly polished production values but this all adds to the film’s raw, urgent atmosphere, several of the locations having been previously Nazi offices or buildings, the ‘sets’ being shown largely as they had been left. Having been first asked to make a documentary, he instead went for a fictional narrative which was based on elements of several true stories, and uses this to not only show the situation many Romans found themselves facing, but also the often blurred and indistinct lines in society in such an ‘open city’, the Germans trying to use the priest’s faith against him and get him to confess what he knows about the resistance movement, and in an unsettling and upsetting sequence, the girlfriend of resistance member Giorgio, Marina (Maria Michi - Paisan / La Monaca De Monza) betraying him in exchange for luxury items, such as a fur coat, which have no use in the city at the time, since to wear it would clearly mark her out as a collaborator. Although on a limited budget and schedule, Rossellini also gets powerful, convincing performances from his two leads, Aldo Fabrizi (The Flowers Of St. Francis / Three Steps North) as Don Pietro and Anna Magnani (The Rose Tattoo / Fellini’s Roma) as Pina, both of whom would go on to become Italian cinema icons. The film is also not afraid to deliver the audience a crushing blow at the end, which still has the power to shock, but yet still is a powerful film which enforces the values of courage, hope, faith and loyalty in the worst of circumstances.