Filmed from April to June 1962, Mamma Roma is the second feature film by Pier Paolo Pasolini, who had chosen for the leading role one of the iconic actresses of post-war Italian cinema: Anna Magnani. She had accepted with conviction the part of the prostitute who tries a ransom for herself and her teenage son (Ettore Garofolo in his acting debut). After the initial technical and professional disagreements between director and interpreter – Pasolini shoots short shots, with many cuts, while Magnani is used to long sequences that allow her to get the best out of her performances – the making of the film went on smoothly and in harmony.
This is documented by the photos on display, taken by two of the most important set photographers of Italian cinema: Divo Cavicchioli (1924 – 1996) and Angelo Novi (1930 – 1997), who worked with Pasolini on the set of various films – Novi in Il Vangelo secondo Matteo (The Gospel According to Matthew) and Teorema, just to name a few; Cavicchioli in Uccellacci e uccellini (The Hawks and the Sparrows).
The images focus on the crew, the actors, and the set but do not forget the context in which the film was shot. Attributing the individual shots to one or the other of the two authors is still difficult today, but a clue could come from the equipment used: Cavicchioli preferred a Rolleiflex (6x6 negatives) while Novi, coming from photojournalism, used a Leica (35mm). So, we might hazard that the square shots are by Divo Cavicchioli and the rectangular ones by Angelo Novi.
All photos come from the Centro Cinema Città di Cesena’s archive.