Nights of Cabiria

Nights of Cabiria (1957)
IMDB #152 [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050783/]

The Gist:
This marks the third film I've seen of Fellini's through the span of this project, the second featuring his wife Giulietta Masina. Unlike La Strada, which I still feel is an overrated film, I cannot deny Cabiria's genius. Like La Strada, secondary characters seem to come and go in Cabiria. You have the deadbeat boyfriend in the beginning of the film, the famous filmmaker, the man who gives small items to the homeless holed up in "the caves", the wandering priest, the accountant (who actually plays a pretty prominent part toward the end). It gives the film a wonderful feeling of the chance encounters of someone's life, and how these small moments define who we are. It also seems to be a fascinating mutation from the tendencies of Neorealism, proceeding this film by a little more than a decade. These characters interact with the lively Maria (or Cabiria), the main character. It took me a little while to figure out that she was a prostitute. The fact that it took me a little while has to do with not knowing anything about the film going into it and a deft subtly about the character, slowly hinting at the fact but never outright saying it. However, the effect of her station in life moves the drama of the story nicely, be it seeking religious sanctification or love. She moves through the film in a brash and contentious way, but underneath she is vulnerable. Fellini's ability to draw on that vulnerability through minute gestures throughout the film instead of crudely hammering them into his audience, shows how much he had matured as a filmmaker at this point in his career.