Where Is Freedom (Dov'e la liberta)?

Reviewer: James van Maanen
Rating (out of 5): ****

The name Roberto Rossellini generally brings to mind films such as Open City and Paisan, along with the phrase Italian neo-realism. Like most world-class filmmakers, Rossellini is more profound and complex than any label might indicate, as the recent Lionsgate release of two of his lesser-known works (to Americans) should make clear. One of these, Era Notte a Roma (Escape By Night), from 1960, is an interesting example of Rossellini's neo-realist style at work on a tale of Italy toward the end of WWII's German occupation. I've reviewed Notte in greater length on my blog TrustMovies, but it is the second – and earlier (1954) – movie, Dov' e La Libertà (Where Is Freedom)?, that most surprises.

Although humor is not entirely absent from many of this director's films, comedy is not something one tends to recall in Rossellini's work. So it's rather surprising to find one of Italy's great comics – Totò – starring in Dov' e La Libertà (Where Is Freedom)? Beginning in a courtroom and taking the form of an extended flashback, the movie explains in leisurely fashion how it is that a middle-aged barber, after serving 22 years in prison for a "crime of passion," has just been arrested for breaking back into that same prison. In the process of telling his story to the courtroom and judges, the little barber lays bare the soul of post-war Italy. A pretty sight it ain't. It is comic, in fact, almost solely because the lead character is played by Totò, a fellow whom you have only to look at before breaking into a grin.

Along this ever-optimistic, middle-aged Candide-ish character's short journey, he first comes across a statuesque young woman who introduces him to a group of marathon dancers with whom he becomes involved. From there, it's on to a boarding house, an old prison friend and finally into the fold of family. Events grow darker, uglier, with every step, yet Totò, bless him, keeps things light and oddly effervescent, even as we grow ever more appalled by the behavior of most of the people on view. Hypocrisy and greed are rampant on every level of society – rich, poor, men, women, young, old -- and Rossellini achieves a lovely, ironic balance between Totò's hope and our despair.

In its situations and events (if not its style or realistic effects: the film was made over fifty years ago, after all) Dov'è la libertà...? is as black a comedy as you're likely to find. I cannot imagine what the citizens of Italy must have thought of this mirror held up to their smug, self-satisfied faces at the time of its release.

The Lionsgate DVD set is extras-free, but the films are more than enough. Their transfers are quite different, however, with Totò's movie appearing in wonderful, rich black-and-white, as though it had been made yesterday. In the case of Era Note a Roma,there must not have been nearly as good a print to strike from, as the transfer is much less polished: grainy and with a few scenes almost to dark to view. It remains, however, very much worth seeing.