Nights of Cabiria background creation
2022-04-26 06:01
Fellini's filming of "Cabiria" originated from a small figure conceived for Anna Magnani. Rossellini is looking for an inspiration and theme to make a short film to be combined with another short film based on Jean Cocteau’s life experience that has already been filmed. Magnani asked Fellini to think of a good story for Rossellini. So, he drew up a story about a little prostitute who was taken back to the apartment by a male celebrity who was arguing with his girlfriend, but because the male celebrity had a good relationship with his girlfriend, he could only hide in the bathroom overnight. However, Magnani does not think that the protagonist of this story is suitable for her to play. Fellini brought up another story: a poor female was pregnant by a big beard she mistook for Saint Joseph. Magnani likes this story very much, and this is the later movie "Miracle"
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A few years later, when Fellini was filming the night scene of "The White Chief" in Rome, he named an unnamed prostitute character in the script "Kabylia". Giulietta Masina used his own comical imagination to interpret this character, which made Fellini feel that a little figure with the same power as Jelsona in "The Road" was born. From then on, he was determined to make a film that was entirely "Kabylia". Later, while filming "The Liar", he met a mad woman living in a dilapidated wooden house. The woman told him her story. In the end, Fellini combined the little story conceived a few years ago with the story of the mad woman to create "Cabiria"
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Extended Reading
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Heavy prostitute with leopard spots: [in Italian, preening and admiring the shadow of her own full figure on the wall] Look how classy I am!
Long-haired prostitute: [in Italian, disparagingly] You look like Moby Dick!
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Maria 'Cabiria' Ceccarelli: [in Italian]
[to Alberto holding up boiled lobster]
Maria 'Cabiria' Ceccarelli: And what's this? I saw it in a movie once.