neo-realism
neo-realism,a movement in the post-war Italian novel and film which may be seen as a continuation of verismo . While its narratives were naturalistic on the surface, the works were imbued with a lyrical populism that was occasionally sentimental and even owed something to the style of films made under Fascism. As Fascism collapsed, the Resistance emerged as the theme of neo-realist novels by Beppe Fenoglio ( 1922 – 63 ), Elio Vittorini ( 1908 – 66 ), and the young Calvino , and of films by Rossellini , whose Roma città aperta (Rome Open City, 1945 ) is a classic of this genre. At the same time, neo-realism documented the lives of poor people in the underdeveloped south or struggling in northern cities: this strand is represented by the novels of Carlo Levi ( 1902 – 75 ) and Pavese , and by the films of De Sica (e.g. Bicycle Thieves, 1948 ), Olmi, Rosi, and the young Visconti.
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