Offscreen Notes
Visioni Proibite
Hot off the press, just landed in my lap is regular Offscreen contributor Roberto Curti’s latest book co-authored with Alessio Di Rocco, with a preface by filmmaker Carlo Lizzani, Visioni Proibite: I Film Vietati dall censura Italiana (1947-1968). Roughly translated (from original Italian) to Prohibited Viewings: Films Forbidden by the Italian Censors (1947-1968). At over 570 pages, this is the first of a two-volume set from Lindau publishers. The authors had access to primary documents and have come up with a chronological listing (tagged by a censor number) of films, not just Italian, that were censored in Italy. Each entry has the original title submitted to the censors, and (if changed) the eventual release title, (with running time differences noted in film meters), home video release, country of origin, year, credits, followed by a brief plot synopsis and then a detailed analysis of the film’s treatment by the censors, supported by contemporaneous ministerial documentation, and secondary material from newspapers, magazines, and trade journals. The authors set up the historical context in a long, detailed opening chapter entitled “Panni sporchi, anime candide. La censura nel dopoguerra, 1947-1962” (“Dirty Laundry, Candid Souls: Post-War Censorship, 1947-1962”), beginning with the Minister in charge of Entertainment, Giulio Andreotti’s regulations and his eventual run-ins with Neo-realism (out of which grew the chapter’s title, when Andreotti criticized Neo-realism for the negative view of Italy Neo-realist films exported around the world (Andreotti once saying about Neo-realism, that dirty laundry should be done at home). The book is a remarkable piece of historical analysis, relying on previously untapped primary material to project how the film censorship reflected and was in turn shaped by the social and political mores of Italy, and primarily the incumbent Christian Democratic Party, which led Italy either as either a majority or minority government, from 1946 to 1994.
