by School of Film
June 21st 2022
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Brian Berry won the 2022 Film Essay Prize for his paper "Bitter Rice, neither Neorealism nor Noir" written for FILM 487 Transnational Film Noir.
Through textual and historical analysis, this paper discusses Giuseppe De Santis' 1949 film Bitter Rice in order to explain its filmic contradictions, and place it in between debates about the borders of noir and neorealism. I argue that the combination of neorealism and noir that defines the film is a consequence of the immediate conditions of post-war Italy when the residual power of the Italian resistance meant that the hope of left-wing governance was still alive.
Bio: Brian Berry is a graduating senior in the PSU School of Film. His research interest is the intersection of Italian communism and post-war Italian culture. He hopes to research this area further in graduate school. He also likes capybaras, F1, and Dua Lipa.
Video essay: Bitter Rice, Neither Neorealism nor NoirCheck out more award winning work from the 2022 Spring Showcase!