Love. A sentiment that grows on one unexpectedly. It could bring two strangers together, broadens one's knowledge of life, makes one gain faith in oneself but most of all transforms one. This is what happens to the characters in Luchino Visconti's Le Notti Bianche, an apt adaptation of Fyodor Dosteovsky's 1858 short story White Night.
A fairy tale where the one who believes in love the most triumphs at the end. A young girl, Natalia (Maria Schell) living with her blind grandmother falls in love with the first man she sees, the tenant (Jean Marais) Her feelings grow for him almost immediately. They have to part and he promises to meet her in a year’s time. And she decides to wait. But when the date comes for them to meet, she is disappointed not to find him. Waiting in the city, she encounters a lonely man Mario (Marcello Mastroianni) who is new to the city and spends his hours at night walking alone, in deep thought. Through the telling of her past, we find out more about them. A young girl who is living a very sheltered life and a man who is free to enjoy the liberty of a city. But he prefers to experience the dreamy side of the city. So he spends time with Natalia. At times, she's weary yet he manages to withstand her hysterics, sadness, mood swings and uncertainty. He in turn falls in love with her until he too is heart broken when her first lover appears. She goes back to living his life the way he used to. Dosteovsky's story was also adapted to the screen by Robert Bresson, Nights of a Dreamer (1971) a colored and more minimalist approach to the adaptation with the story taking place in Paris.
The space renders a precise location where the story takes place over four nights. The film shows them all interconnected. A love story that blurs the boundaries between the imagination and reality is the central theme of this film. The film won the Venice Silver lion (1957). Satyajit Ray's second film in The Apu Trilogy, Aparajiti took the Golden Lion. Mario is the sweet and wise gentleman, who thinks he can control his feelings. He soon finds himself trapped in the fervour of love. With it comes suffering and now both experience its bitterness. The only time they forget about love and enjoy themselves is when they dance to the rock and roll tune of Bill Haley and His Comets's 13 women and one man in a dancing club/ restaurant.
The director of photography is Giuseppe Rotunno also know for his work on Fellini's Amarcord. The lighting and photography blurs the realms of reality and illusion, highlighing Visconti's astute visionary style of using medium and long shots, stylised lighting to tell this story. Shadows fall over the walls, the passing boats, the passersby, the lamp posts, the opening and closing of the wooden venetian shutters and precise framing. Although Le Nottie Bianche is an exception to Visconti's other films, including his first feature film Ossessione based on the novel The postman always rings twice. He used the same medium and long shots to tell this story, creating the fantasy-like mood that is characteristic to this setting. Visconti's mise en scene translates the inner worlds of Mario and Natalia.
This space was created in a studio. It plays a significant role in the telling of the story because it enables Mario and Natalia to meet, part, lose each other and find back each other over the bridge, hiding in the street corners and taking a boat.
Visconti together with Rosselini and De Sica were the forerunners of Italian neo-realism cinema in post-world war Italy. He continued to adapt various literary texts to film like The leopard and Death in Venice.
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