History of Italian Cinema

Peter Bondanella is the author of a number of groundbreaking books such as: Hollywood Italians, The Cinema of Federico Fellini, and The Films of Roberto Rossellini. In 2009, he was elected to the European Academy of Sciences and the Arts for his contributions to the history of the Italian cinema and his translations or editions of Italian literary classics (Dante, Boccaccio, Machiavelli, Vasari, Cellini). He was Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature, Film Studies and Italian at Indiana University Bloomington, USA.Federico Pacchioni is Sebastian Paul & Marybelle Musco Chair of Italian Studies at Chapman University, Orange, California, USA. In his research, he focuses on cases of artistic synergy and intermediality across Italian cinema, literature, and theatre. He is the author of numerous articles and of the monograph Inspiring Fellini: Literary Collaborations behind the Scenes (2014).

• PrefaceAcknowledgement1. An Ancient Cradle for a Newborn Medium: The Rise of Silent Cinema in Italy2. Industry and Ideology: The Talkies during the Fascist Era3. Neorealism: A Revolutionary and Problematic ?New Film Aesthetic 4. Neorealism’s Many Faces: Widening the Range of the Camera’s Eye 5. The Cinema of the Reconstruction and the Return of Melodrama 6. Entertainment on an Epic Scale: The Italian Peplum 7. Commedia all’italiana: Social Criticism for Laughter’s Sake 8. The Italian Art Film: Auteurism in Visconti, Antonioni, Fellini, and De Sica 9. Neorealism’s Legacy to a New Generation, and the Italian Political film 10. Myth, Marx, and Freud in Pier Paolo Pasolini and Bernardo Bertolucci 11. The Spaghetti Nightmare: The Heyday of Italian Horror Films 12. A Fistful of Pasta: Sergio Leone and the Spaghetti Western 13. Mystery, Gore, and Mayhem: The Italian Giallo 14. The Poliziesco: Italian Crime Films from the 1970s to the Present 15. Italy’s Truly Popular Genre: Tragicomedy from the 1980s to the Present 16. A Fellinian Ascendant: The Auteur in Contemporary Italian Cinema 17. Weaving Present and Past: The Contemporary Italian Drama Notes Bibliography List of photo credits Index

By reconfiguring and expanding upon Bondanella’s original work, both authors have ensured that A History of Italian Cinema remains relevant and necessary as Italy’s cinemascape continues to evolve. It is, therefore, a piece of scholarship akin to that which it describes, adapting to waves of the present while grasping to the roots of its past.