Rossellini in Texas

Tonight, as part of the month-long series Rossellini: Restored and Revisited, the Austin Film Society in Austin, Texas, will screen Roberto Rossellini’s 1950 existential masterpiece Stromboli. Starring the radiant Ingrid Bergman, the film was the pair’s first screen collaboration, and also marked the beginning of their romantic affair. Exquisitely captured by cinematographer Otello Martelli, Stromboli centers on the story of a Lithuanian refugee who, after WWII, marries an Italian fisherman and escapes to his home on a volcanic Aeolian island. Weaving the honesty of Italian neorealism with the emotion of melodrama, this is an essential work of the creative partnership between Rossellini and Bergman. See the film this evening in Austin, and even if you’re not in Texas, below you can watch Bergman’s gorgeous Super 8 home movies capturing her time spent with Rossellini on set off the coast of Sicily.