was shot on the streets of Rome for the most part.
The new realistic style of the post World War II era that came to be known as Italian Neo-Realist focused on the lives and struggles of ordinary people trying to get by in a war ravaged, poverty-stricken country. In subject matter and style, the Neo-Realists created a body of work between 1945 and 1949 that had a profound effect on world cinema. The first of these films, Roberto RosselliniÆs groundbreaking ôOpen Cityö (Roma, citta aperta) was shot in 1945, and like the films that followed, it dealt with contemporary social issues from a humanist perspective; the filmmakers were not out to offer solutions to social problems, but to depict them by showing the effect on individual lives. The problems faced by the characters in Neo-Realism Italian films ôhad some degree of immediacy and broad concernö (Ellis 211). Italian art cinema dealt with social problems, but its emphasis was on the effects on individual lives, not explaining causes or coming up with solutions. The context, however, was social and political. Classic Hollywood films, in contrast, such as ôCasablanca,ö emphasized causes and solutions and star characters.
The films of Bernardo Bertolucci, from 1964 to the 1972 ôLast Tango in Paris,ö explored the structure of society just as De Sica did in ôThe Bicycle Thief.ö Although ôLast Tango in Parisö centers on the relationship and behavior of Paul and Jeanne, Bertolucci uses his film as a means of exploring the structure of society, the effects of bourgeois repression and despairing characters seeking human contact through sex (Ellis 343). In comparison to these films is ôCasablancaö which, although it took place during World War I
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