On the Loose in Amsterdam

The Italian film poster for THE GIRL IN THE PICTURE WINDOW (1961), directed by Luciano Emmer.

The controversial problem of immigration in Italy has been a problem for decades, not just with internal migration of workers from the south to the north, but also with the influx of refugees from Africa and other areas around the Mediterranean. Not surprisingly, there have been numerous Italian films to address this situation over the years but only a handful of them have received praise and recognition outside their own country. Among them are Pietro Germi’s Il Cammino della Speranza (The Path of Hope, 1950), in which a group of Sicilian workers try to emigrate illegally to France, I Magliari (The Swindlers, 1959), Francesco Rosi’s drama about an out-of-work Italian miner (Renato Salvatore) in Germany, and Lina Wertmuller’s Tutto a Posto e Niente in Ordine (All Screwed Up, 1974), which focuses on immigrants from southern Italy trying to find work in Milan. To this short list, I would like to add Luciano Emmer’s rarely seen La Ragazza in Vetrina (The Girl in the Picture Window, 1961), a tale about two immigrant miners in Belgium who enjoy a weekend getaway in Amsterdam.

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EYE – Film Archive of the Future

eye_film_institute_amsterdam
On a recent November trip to Amsterdam with my wife, we had no set agenda other than pure pleasure – to soak in the culture, see the city sights and various art museums, tour the canals and neighborhoods, sample the great beers, and occasionally retreat from the constant onslaught of bicycles into some cosy cafe or coffeeshop. (A word of warning to first time visitors to Amsterdam: bicyclists have the right of way over pedestrians and their own designated lanes everywhere. If you don’t look carefully both ways before stepping across a bike lane, you could get creamed by someone going 30 miles an hour or more. The trams (streetcars) can be just as deadly if you aren’t paying close attention to the street traffic.)      Continue reading