TEHRAN-The cinematheque of House of Cinema in Tehran will screen “La Strada,” a 1954 Italian drama film directed by Federico Fellini, on Wednesday. 

After the movie screening at 4:30 p.m., it will be followed by a review session with the presence of film critics Houshang Golmakani and Maziar Fekri Ershad, Mehr reported.

“La Strada” tells the story of Gelsomina, a simple-minded young woman (Giulietta Masina) bought from her mother by Zampanò (Anthony Quinn), a brutish strongman who takes her with him on the road.

Fellini described his film as “a complete catalog of my entire mythological world, a dangerous representation of my identity that was undertaken with no precedent whatsoever”. As a result, the film demanded more time and effort than any of his other works, before or later. Initial critical reaction was harsh, and the film's screening at the 15th Venice Film Festival in 1954 was the occasion of a bitter controversy that escalated into a public brawl between Fellini's supporters and detractors. Despite all this, the film won the Silver Lion at the festival.

Subsequently, however, “La Strada” has become “one of the most influential films ever made,” according to the American Film Institute. It won more than 50 international awards, including the inaugural Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1957. It was placed fourth in the 1992 British Film Institute directors' list of cinema's top 10 films.

In 2008, the film was included on the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage's 100 Italian films to be saved, a list of 100 films that “have changed the collective memory of the country between 1942 and 1978.”

SS/