BiographyThe Italian director who pioneered that country's school of neorealist cinema, he is still best remembered for his early, lowbudget, shaky-camera works dealing with life in a country torn by war. An architect's son who began making shorts in 1938, Rossellini actually directed a few features sponsored by Italy's Fascist government during World War 2. In 1945, he created an international sensation with the wrenching, frank Open City. Shot almost entirely on location in real houses, apartments, and exteriors, its distinctly primitive look, combined with its moving storyline and a sterling performance by Anna Magnani, heralded a new era in filmmaking. Rossellini subsequently made Paisan (1946) and Germany Year Zero (1947) in this vein, but began moving toward a more polished, almost Romanticist style. He met Hollywood star Ingrid Bergman in the late 1940s after she wrote him a fan letter; they fell in love and had a child, and the resultant scandal (Bergman was married at the time) led to her virtual banishment from Hollywood. Together the two made several films (1949's Stromboli is the best known) highly regarded by cineastes but virtually unknown to mass audiences. They eventually married and had twins, one of whom is model/actress Isabella Rossellini. Their marriage broke up when Rossellini took up with (and impregnated) an Indian screenwriter in 1957.
The year 1959 brought the director's first popular success in some time: General Della Rovere another WW2 story, this one starring fellow director Vittorio De Sica. In the 1960s Rossellini made several period pieces shot in a peculiarly rigorous style, including 1966's The Rise of Louis XIV. Thought incredibly ponderous by many, these films also have their admirers. Rossellini also contributed a scenario to a Godard film, 1962's Les Carabiniers. He continued working up until his death, making historical films for Italian TV.
