Production for Rome, Open City began on 18 January 1945 in the capital’s 2nd rione, the Trevi district, home to the fountain of the same name and the Quirinal Palace. During the first part of the shoot, Roberto Rossellini and the crew were based around Piazza Barberini.
Rome was in ruins, but the director came up with a makeshift set: a small studio where he set up Don Pietro Pellegrini’s (Aldo Fabrizi) room and the Gestapo headquarters. The theatre was built on the site of a betting hall, in Via degli Avignonesi, parallel to the famous Via del Tritone. It was in this street that Rossellini happened to meet Vito Annichiarico, a child who earned his living as a “sciuscià”, a shoeshine boy. He was to become Marcello, the protagonist’s son.
The director chose to shoot some exterior scenes in this area, both for convenience and because of its distinctive character. With its squares, its mix of Baroque and Umbertine buildings, hotels and trattorias, it is one of the most evocative areas in central Rome. In the film, Giorgio Manfredi, the leader of the Resistance played by Marcello Pagliero, stops for lunch at a tavern right next door, at 34 Via degli Avignonesi.
It was very lively area in the 1920s. In the Via degli Avignonesi area, for example, the young Alberto Moravia was a regular while he was working on Gli indifferenti (1929). The writer frequented an avant-garde cultural centre that included the Indipendenti experimental theatre and a gallery where the most innovative artists of the time could exhibit their work. This was in a vast basement that stretched from Via degli Avignonesi to Via Rasella, the street where some partisans carried out an attack against German soldiers, an event that was followed by a Nazi reprisal known as the Fosse Ardeatine massacre.
Now back to today’s Rome. The rione Trevi is one of the most beautiful, well-loved and visited districts in Rome. One of the city’s most famous landmarks is located here: the Baroque-era Trevi Fountain, made iconic by films such as Fellini’s La Dolce Vita, in which Anita Ekberg takes a dip and calls out to Mastroianni. It’s customary to toss a coin and make a wish here – so go ahead. This fountain is not the only important one in the rione. There’s also the Tritone fountain in the affluent Piazza Barberini, which is also very popular with Romans and tourists. Then there are the ones at the crossroads of Via delle Quattro Fontane: the Diana and Juno fountains are still part of the Trevi district, while the two fountains representing the Arno and Tiber rivers belong to the Monti and Castro Pretorio districts.
Via degli Avignonesi runs along the edge of the rione Trevi. Just 400 metres further on, after a passing glimpse of Colonna, the 3rd rione and crossing Via Frattina, you find yourself in Campo Marzio, the 4th rione, on the southern side of Piazza di Spagna. The view is dominated by the column of the Immaculate Conception, and a little further on are the Barcaccia fountain and the Spanish Steps. This is where Rossellini shot the opening scenes of Rome, Open City: in the opening sequences, we see Piazza di Spagna crossed by marching German soldiers, while the character Giorgio Manfredi (Marcello Pagliero) manages to escape capture by fleeing from the roof of a guesthouse at number 51 in the square, on the corner of Via Frattina.
Still in the rione Campo Marzio, walking towards Piazza del Popolo along Via del Babuino, between boutiques and monuments, you come to another location from the film. It is the antique shop that conceals the clandestine printing press where Don Pietro receives the money destined for the partisans: it overlooks the picturesque Via Margutta, still a street filled with antique shops and art galleries.
This district too has undergone a transformation. Campo Marzio is a lively, chic place, almost entirely geared towards shopping and leisure. The district is one of the most elegant and sought-after corners of the city, with many boutiques and ateliers of the world’s most famous fashion and accessory brands. So indulge in some serious shopping, sip a cocktail in one of the bars, or stroll around and take in the beauty.
Even today, Via Margutta continues to attract the interest of curious visitors and devotees, not least because Federico Fellini and Giulietta Masina once lived at number 110. Already made famous by William Wyler’s film Roman Holiday, in the 1970s this street became the venue for the Associazione Cento Pittori, which organises art exhibitions along the street every year, in spring and autumn. For a few days, the streets are transformed into open-air art galleries, and artists from a variety of countries around the world bring life and colour to this timeless place.
If the rione Trevi, with Via degli Avignonesi and its immediate surroundings, is the birthplace of Rome, Open City, the heart of the film beats in Via Raimondo Montecuccoli. It is a short street on the outskirts of the Pigneto district, which thanks to Rossellini has become an unmissable destination for film buffs visiting Rome.
We’re now at the corner of Piazzale Prenestino, a few steps from the Prenestino Tower; a little further on, continuing in the same direction, you would arrive at Largo Preneste, where Vito Annichiarico, the child who plays Marcello, lived.
Pina, the protagonist played by Anna Magnani, lives at number 17 with her future husband, the partisan Francesco, played by Francesco Grandjacquet. Romoletto, a disabled boy whom Don Pietro stops from throwing a bomb at German soldiers, lives in an attic at number 36. Most notably, Via Montecuccoli is the street where Pina meets a tragic end, gunned down by machine gun fire as she chases after the lorry that is taking Francesco away from her forever.
Rossellini was inspired by a real event that took place in Rome, but in another district, the rione Prati: the murder of Teresa Talotta Gullace, who was killed in the street by a German soldier while protesting in front of a prison, demanding to speak to her imprisoned husband. Roman actress Anna Magnani was also very familiar with this tragedy, and gave a deeply emotional performance. After watching that masterful scene, poet Giuseppe Ungaretti wrote to her words that every viewer of the film can relate to: “I heard you shout ‘Francesco’ running after a truck and I’ve never forgotten you”.
Today, in Via Montecuccoli, visitors can see a commemorative plaque put up by Rome City Council in 1995 in front of the door where Pina’s chase began. The street has become a “place of remembrance”, and in fact some of the extras who appeared in the film still live in the building.
Via Montecuccoli, on the northern edge of Pigneto, is now a part of Rome where traces of antiquity, such as the mausoleum of Torrione Prenestino, coexist with abandoned industrial areas undergoing transformation, and trendy bistros and bars are popping up along the streets. This was not the case in the 17th century, when it was all villas, vegetable gardens and vineyards, nor at the end of the 19th century, when it was just a suburban village inhabited by workers and immigrants.
The Pigneto of 1945, with its simple and often downtrodden people, could not fail to play a leading role in Rome, Open City. It was where Don Pietro Pappagallo, one of the victims of the Fosse Ardeatine and the inspiration for the character of Don Pietro Pellegrini (Aldo Fabrizi), was active. Don Pappagallo had come to Pigneto from Puglia and provided pastoral care to the migrant workers at CISA/SNIA Viscosa, a large yarn factory on the Via Prenestina, now disused and incorporated into the green space of the Parco delle Energie. The working-class soul of Pigneto had made it one of the centres of the Resistance against the German occupation. Rossellini, true to reality, chose to set the key scenes of his masterpiece in this neighbourhood. The church where Don Pietro officiates in the film is, at least in its exterior, also located in Pigneto – it is the church of Sant’Elena on the Via Casilina. Here in 1943, the real-life parish priest of Sant’Elena, Father Raffaele Melis, died while rescuing the victims of a bombing on the nearby railway. The interiors of the church in the film are those of Santa Maria dell’Orto in Trastevere.
Pigneto, with its working-class stories, later became particularly dear to Pier Paolo Pasolini, often considered the last of the neorealists. The director and writer, who described the neighbourhood as “the crown of thorns surrounding the city of God”, set his film Accattone (1961) there, focusing on Via Fanfulla da Lodi, Via del Pigneto and Via Ettore Giovenale. In Via Fanfulla da Lodi, film-loving tourists can admire a series of murals dedicated to Pasolini (SEE ENTRY IN DESTINATIONS FILE Murals of Pigneto), which are part of the Omaggio a Pasolini (Tribute to Pasolini) project.
Today, this neighbourhood has a youthful atmosphere and is very popular with young people, partly due to its proximity to Sapienza University of Rome. It’s an “alternative” neighbourhood, filled with students and creatives, with a bohemian atmosphere and lively nightlife. You can spend many carefree hours wandering its streets, browsing vintage markets, sampling street food, and visiting traditional trattorias, ethnic eateries, trendy bars or literary cafés. It’s lost its predominantly working-class spirit, but not its charm, becoming one of Rome’s most vibrant neighbourhoods today, culturally and artistically speaking.
The façade of the church of Sant’Elena, that of Don Pietro in Rome, Open City and of Father Melis in real life, opens onto the first stretch of the Via Casilina. This is the very long road that starts at Porta Maggiore and passes through Pigneto, Torpignattara and most of Rome’s 5th municipio before leaving the capital in a south-easterly direction. Driven by the transformation of Pigneto, other neighbourhoods along this road are also becoming Roman nightlife hotspots, with pubs and clubs, street art and particularly active cultural centres. This was not the case before the 1960s, of course: back then, to quote Pasolini, Via Casilina ran through “a Shanghai of allotments, streets, wire fences, shanty towns, open spaces, building sites and clusters of tower blocks”.
The street can be spotted in several scenes from Rome, Open City, and once again, this is no coincidence. Remaining near the church of Sant’Elena, Pina confides her past and her worries to Don Pietro as they walk along the Casilina ring road, on the stretch of road (less than 500 metres) that connects Via Casilina to Via Prenestina. Today, the Ecomuseo Casilino Ad Duad Lauros extends along this road, encompassing other urban areas often featured in neorealist cinema, from Villa Gordiani to Centocelle.
Along Via Casilina there are numerous archaeological remains from the Roman era, such as the Catacombs of Marcellinus and Peter; Parco Casilino-Labicano, which contains the ruins of villas such as that of Saint Helena (mother of Emperor Constantine); and the Catacomb of Saint Castulus.
Via Casilina, which links up with Via Prenestina, includes the Centocelle district, includes the Centocelle district, where the old blends with the modern, with some recently built villas alongside buildings constructed during the period of intense urbanisation in the 1950s.
