| Gente del Po | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Michelangelo Antonioni |
| Cinematography | Piero Portalupi |
| Edited by | Carlo Alberto Chiesa |
| Music by | Mario Labroca |
Production companies |
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Release date |
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Running time | 11 minuntes |
| Country | Italy |
| Language | Italian |
Gente del Po, sometimes referred to in English asPeople of the Po Valley, is an Italiandocumentary short film directed byMichelangelo Antonioni in 1943 and released in 1947. It was Antonioni's debut film and is, together withLuchino Visconti'sOssessione, considered to be one of the earliest examples ofItalian neorealism.[1][2]Gente del Po documents people living on or near thePo river, including barge workers and fishermen.
Gente del Po was shot in 1943 near Antonioni's home townFerrara, but in the light of the escalating events ofWorld War II, the editing of the film had to be shelved.[3] When Antonioni started editing the film in 1947, much of the shot material had been irreversibly damaged due to improper storage and handling.[3][4] In later interviews, Antonioni referred to his film as his "own brand of neorealism"[4] by focussing on people instead of sceneries, objects or pieces of art which, in his view, Italian documentary filmmakers had done up to this point.[3] Without his knowledge, Antonioni explained, he had been on the same path as Visconti who was shootingOssessione at the same time in the same region.[3]
Gente del Po has been screened as part of retrospectives on Antonioni at various festivals and institutions, including theMuseum of Modern Art,[5] theBerkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive,[6] and theCinémathèque Française.[7] It has been released on home media as part ofThe Criterion Collection's release of Antonioni'sRed Desert.[8]