Characteristics of Neorealism

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Characteristics of Neorealism Neorealism started after the World War II; when Europe was dealing with a tornado of poverty. It started back in Italy of that era; which is why it’s mostly referred to as Italian Neorealism. The first Neorealist film makers are big names in cinema, film makers such as Antonioni, Visconti, Puccini, Zavattini, De Santis, etc. According to Zavattini (2003): ‘The most important characteristic, and the most important innovation, of what is called neorealism, it seems to me, is to have realized that the necessity of the 'story' was only an unconscious way of disguising a human defeat, and that the kind of imagination it involved was simply a technique of superimposing dead formulas over living social facts.’ (p.1) It is clear that Neorealism is not the type of cinema that is pursuing to excite its audience, nor to make them cry; Neorealism is the documentation of a real life situation as it happens in the society around the film maker. This genre has never tried to look beautiful to the audience; instead it tries to mirror the reality of society with all its miseries, shortcomings or little joys. After the World War II, Europe was very poor; there were no jobs and people very miserably living their lives without hopes for a better future. Zavattini explains, ‘It requires a true and real interest in what is happening, a search for the most deeply hidden human values, which is why we feel that the cinema must recruit not only intelligent people, but, above all, 'living' souls, the morally richest people.’ (2003:p.2) Neorealist cinema’s biggest achievement is to reach the intellectuals only, but to obtain the hearts of the masses, the living souls. That might be one of the reasons you don’t see too many cinematic approaches in the Neorealist cinema, but subtle and at the same time artistic procedures that lead to great films such as De
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