Diva: Defiance and Passion in Early Italian Cinema

by Angela Dalle Vacche, Guy Maddin (Introduction)

A CHOICE Outstanding Academic Book As scientific discoveries and technological advances radically modernized Europe around the turn of the twentieth century, artists of all types began questioning what it means to be human in an increasingly mechanistic world. Animated by a luminous goddess at its center, the diva film provided a forum for denouncing social evils and exploring new models of behavior among the sexes. These melodramas of courtship, seduction, marriage, betrayal, abandonment, child custody, and public reputation, to mention only a few themes, offered women a vision of—if not always a realistic hope for—emancipation and self-discovery. In Diva , Angela Dalle Vacche offers the first authoritative study of this important "film" genre of the cinema that preceded the Great War of 1914-1918. She analyzes some seventy films, as well as the work of actresses such as Francesca Bertini, Lyda Borelli, and Pina Menichelli, to establish what the diva film contributed to the modernist development of the "new woman." Contrasting the Italian diva with the Hollywood vamp Theda Bara and the famous Danish star Asta Nielsen, Dalle Vacche shows how the diva oscillates between articulating Henri Bergson's vibrant life-force ( élan vital ) and representing the suffering figure of the Catholic mater dolorosa . Taking readers on a fascinating tour that includes the Ballets Russes, orientalism, art nouveau, Futurism, fashion, prostitution, stunt women in the circus, aviation, anti-Semitism, colonialism, and censorship, Diva sheds important new light on the eccentric implantation of modernity in Italy, as well as on how, before World War I, the filmic image was associated with the powers of the occult and not with the Freudian unconscious, as has been argued until now. Accompanying the Diva Dolorosa Dutch filmmaker Peter Delpeut (Lyrical Nitrate) captures the spirit of the diva in this DVD of clips from early Italian films. Diva Dolorosa presents excerpts of fourteen films from the period 1914–1920, including Malombra, Rapsodia Satanica, and Il Fuoco. It features the work of actresses Lyda Borelli, Pina Menichelli, Francesca Bertini, Soava Gallone, and Elena Makowska. Diva Dolorosa is a Nederlands Filmmuseum production made in coproduction with VPRO television and in collaboration with Cineteca del Comune di Bologna. The DVD was produced by Zeitgeist Films, Ltd.

Genres: Film

330 pages, Paperback

First published April 15, 2008

About the author

Angela Dalle Vacche is Professor of Cinema Studies at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. She has written extensively on the representation of history in film; on Italian women and early cinema; on intermediality and color. She is the author or editor of such works as Film, Art, New Media: Museum without Walls? (2012) and Diva: Defiance and Passion in Early Cinema (2008), and is currently developing a book on African cinema.

Reviews

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

A welcome and interesting read for someone who doesn't frequently tackle non-fiction, or anyone wanting to revive their interest in Italian history, culture and language. Angela Dalle Vacche has clearly put a tremendous amount of energy into researching the historical contexts and philosophical writings that contributed to the figure of the "diva" in early 20th century Italian film.

However, Dalle Vacche forgot to do her homework in the fields of study of feminist and gender theory, even though an analysis of feminist and gender politics in Italian cinema comprised a crucial part of the book. She never provides a coherent explanation of what she means when she tosses around words like "masculinity," "femininity," "feminism," or "natural." She even resorts to the stereotype of cross-dressing as a form of the "grotesque" without problematizing that theatrical trope. Yikes.

[Greta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Explores the phenomenon of the Italian Diva film (at its height between 1914 and 1920), placing it in the context of philosophical and social movements in a deeply repressive and misogynistic society. It's not an easy read--the author's rhetorical flights can be puzzling, but in describing the films in more of a metaphorical than concrete manner helps impart some of the flavor of these crazy and wonderful films. And it gets easier to read as i goes along. As a bonus, the book contains a DVD of the Peter Delpeut compilation film Diva Dolorosa (1999) which ends with Lyda Borelli in the magical finale of Rapsodia Satanica (1915), one of my favorite pieces of film. I've recommended this book/DVD combo to two people already this week, and I normally don't do that.