Paisan ( Paisà ) - DaaVeeDee

Paisan (Blu-Ray) (*)

~~$27.99~~ $21.97

Original Title: Paisà
Screened, competed or awarded at:
BAFTA Awards
Oscar Academy Awards
Venice Film Festival
Other Film Festival Awards

Language Selections:
English ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
English ( Dolby Linear PCM )
German ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
German ( Dolby Linear PCM )
Italian ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
Italian ( Dolby Linear PCM )
Italian ( Subtitles )

Product Origin/Format:
Italy ( Blu-Ray/Region B )

Running Time:
125 min

Aspect Ratio:
Fullscreen

Special Features:
Cast/Crew Interview(s)
Interactive Menu
Scene Access
Black & White

Movie filmed in 1946 and produced in:
Italy ( Italy, Greece )

Directed By:
Roberto Rossellini

Written By:
Sergio Amidei
Klaus Mann

Actors:
Carmela Sazio ..... Carmela (episode I: Sicilia)
Robert Van Loon ..... Joe, the American soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Benjamin Emanuel ..... An American soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Raymond Campbell ..... An American soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Harold Wagner ..... Harry, a German soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Albert Heinze ..... A German soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Merlin Berth ..... Merlin, an American soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Mats Carlson ..... Swede, an American soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Leonard Parrish ..... An American soldier (episode I: Sicilia)
Dots Johnson ..... Joe - the American MP (episode II: Napoli)
Alfonsino Pasca ..... Pasquale (episode II: Napoli)
Maria Michi ..... Francesca (episode III: Roma)
Gar Moore ..... Fred, an American soldier (episode III: Roma)
Harriet Medin ..... Harriet, the nurse (episode IV: Firenze)
Renzo Avanzo ..... Massimo (episode IV: Firenze)

Synopsis:

Six vignettes follow the Allied invasion from July 1943 to winter 1944, from Sicily north to Venice. Communication is fragile. A woman leads an Allied patrol through a mine field; she dies protecting a G.I., but the Yanks think she killed him. A street urchin steals shoes from a G.I. who tracks him to a shanty town. A G.I. meets a woman the day Rome is liberated; in six months they meet again: he's cynical, she's a prostitute. A US nurse braves the trip across the Arno into German fire in search of a partisan she loves. Three chaplains, including a Jew, call on a monastery north in the Apennines. Allied soldiers and partisans try to escape capture in the marshes of the Po.

Roberto Rossellini's Paisan (originally Paisa) is one of the best-known and most important of the postwar Italian neorealist films; certainly it has one of the finest pedigrees, representing the combined talents of two of Italy's most prestigious filmmakers. The second of Rossellini's "war trilogy" (bracketed by Open City and Germany Year Zero), Paisan is divided into six episodes, each elucidating upon the tenuous relationship between the recently liberated Italians and their American liberators. In the first episode, Joe From Jersey (Robert Van Loon), assigned to guard a taciturn Sicilian woman (Carmela Sazio), tries to communicate with his monolingual prisoner. Next, a black MP (Dotts Johnson) is robbed of his shoes by an impoverished Neopolitan street urchin (Alfonsino Pasca). This is followed by an episode set in Rome, where drunken GI Fred (Gar Moore) is reunited with a streetwalker (Maria Michi) whom he's met before but does not recognize. In Florence, American nurse Harriet (Harriet Medin) and an Italian partisan (Gigi Gori) dodge bullets as they make their way through enemy-held territory in search of Harriet's lover. Next comes a comic interlude involving a theological argument between a Catholic, a Protestant, a Jew and a group of Fransiscan monks. The film concludes with a bloody confrontation in the Po Valley between the OSS and a band of intractable Germans who refuse to surrender. Everyone who's ever seen Paisan has his or her favorite episode: by consensus of opinion, the most popular vignettes are the Naples episode (largely adlibbed by actors Dotts Johnson and Alfonsino Pasca) and the thrilling Florentine vignette with Harriet Medin and Gigi Gori. Giulietta Masina, the wife of Federico Fellini, shows up in a bit role; Fellini himself collaborated on the screenplay with Rossellini and Annalena Limentani. Originally released at 115 minutes, Paisan was expertly edited to 90 minutes for American consumption by Stuart Legg and Raymond Spottiswoode.

Roberto Rossellini's film, made in the aftermath of WWII, consists of six distinct chapters, showing various relationships between the American occupiers and the newly liberated Italians. Two of the outstanding episodes see black military policeman Dotts Johnson robbed of his shoes by a cheeky street urchin while the film ends with a reminder that the war was still not won, as German troops prefer to fight a battle to the death.

This product was added to our catalog on Tuesday 03 November, 2015.

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