Gender in Open City and Ciociara

The female characters in Roma Cittá Aperta and La Ciociara are very separated from one another in terms of the roles that they play within their respective films. There is Cesira, a strong, motivated woman whose only real care in life is the well being of her daughter Rosetta. Being the main character of La Ciociara creates a more in depth, complicated character that takes some time to figure out. In Roma there is Pina—similar to Cesira in that she is also a mother, but her character is differently affected by the war thus creating a different scope to view Pina through. In either case, although the women are very different from one another there is one major similarity which connects the women and the two movies together.

It seems that in both movies there is a turning point in which the seriousness of the war can be seen changing the characters’ lives. In both of these scenes within the two films, it is when these two women, Cesira and Pina, are drastically affected by the war when the war confronts them, both in a physical way. In Roma, when Pina’s fiancé is being taken away by the fascists, she runs after him and is shot dead. The seriousness of this scene can be attributed to its abrupt arrival in the film. Prior to Pina’s death, there is slapstick like comedic scene in which the priest fights with an old man to keep him quiet so the ammunition that he hides will not be found. Pina’s death symbolizes the turning point in which the movie takes on a more serious tone and symbolic structure.

Similarly, in La Ciociara, the rape of Cesira and her daughter by the Turkish soldiers transforms the tone of the movie. After this scene, the relationship between mother and daughter becomes more mature and ultimately brings them closer together in the end with the news of Michele’s death. Prior to the rape scene the movie flows along and depicts characters that are not very connected with the war. In both the shooting from Roma and the rape scene in La Ciociara, the...