Abstract
In the final months of fascism, the realization of “La porta del cielo” (“The Gate of Heaven”, 1945), produced by the Catholic Film Center of Rome and directed by Vittorio De Sica, would have served as an “inner exile” to the filmmaker, as well as a miraculous refuge for hundreds of Jews. Thanks to purposely endless footage, Jews hired as extras would have been able to save themselves from deportation to Auschwitz. A touching story, but how true would it be? Are we facing a fairy tale imagined to ennoble the political performance of the filmmaker in the final months of the regime, when the collapse of fascism was already evident? Almost invisible, the film keeps its secret: miracle or fraud? Analyzing a copy exhibited once by RAI, we intend to shed light on a little studied film of one of the masters of Italian neorealism.
Highlights
In the final months of fascism, the realization of “La porta del cielo” (“The Gate of Heaven”, 1945), produced by the Catholic Film Center of Rome and directed by Vittorio De Sica, would have served as an “inner exile” to the filmmaker, as well as a miraculous refuge for hundreds of Jews
Mas permanecem imprecisas as informações sobre os judeus e perseguidos politicos salvos, assim como as verdadeiras razões para o engavetamento de um filme supostamente tão importante para a História do Cinema e do Holocausto
Até que ponto pode-se acreditar na abnegada ação do cineasta em salvar judeus da deportação? Teria sido De Sica - ao lado de Rauol Wallenberg, Aristides de Sousa Mendes, Chiune Sugihara, Giorgio Perlasca, Luiz Martins de Souza Dantas ou Oskar Schindler - um dos Justos do Holocausto?
Summary
O regime fascista proibia os filmes de Charles Chaplin, Jean Vigo, Jean Renoir ou Marcel Carné, mas empregava grandes cineastas, que ficaram mundialmente famosos no pós-guerra, como Luchino Visconti, Vittorio De Sica, Giuseppe De Santis, Roberto Rosselini, Alberto Lattuada. Até o Centro Cattolico Cinematografico (CCC) do Vaticano produziu filmes através da empresa subsidiária Orbis, como o docudrama Tra gli incanti del Pacifico (1938), de Bernardo Wobken; o documentário Pastor Angelicus (1942), de Romolo Marcellini e Luis Trenker; e o drama La porta del cielo (A porta do céu, 1943-1945), de Vittorio De Sica. Mas Luis Trenker foi um dos atores mais populares do cinema nazista. Realizou um dos filmes prediletos de Hitler, Der Rebell (O rebelde, 1932), e inseriu-se com sucesso no cinema de propaganda, com Der verlorene Sohn (1934), Der Kaiser von Kalifornien (1936), Condottieri (1937), Der Feuerteufel (1940). Para demonstrá-lo, Trenker publicou Captain Ladurner, um romance pró-nazista (MOSSE, 1991)
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