Paisàn in 35mm

The second installment in his WWII trilogy and one of Rossellini’s favorites of his films, the episodic Paisàn is another depiction of the tribulations of the Italians under German occupation. Its title translates to “fellow countryman” and takes a broader view of Italy than his previous Rome, Open City (1945) , moving the action outside the capital to focus on the interactions between American armed forces and the country residents impacted by conflict. Future Italian auteur Federico Fellini co-wrote the screenplay, which came together on the fly, with dialogue of each sequence written just before it was filmed.