Monastero di Santa Chiara

It's a great story by Alberto Moravia, and he appears himself in the beginning of the film and at its conclusion, as the listener to the story told by the old variety theatre director, who once employed Esther as the star of his shows, and the film then begins with her on stage singing "Lili Marlene" in Italian, the song that was sung in every nation in every language during the war, and at this stage Italy was still under Nazi occupation. Esther has two suitors or lovers, one a young native Neapolitan and the other a German officer in the SS, Rudolph. Who loves her sincerely, but she is Jewish, and he has orders to arrest her. Instead he saves her life by entrusting her in the care of a monastery "Santa Chiara", and the greatest scenes are from this monastery when it is under bomb attack while the nuns keep singing "Ave Maria" by Schubert. The film is made with her emotions as the main theme of the film, and there are many impressive expressionistic scenes of her anguish, worries and despair - Edda Albertini makes a magnificently convincing performance. She can never forget her Rudolph, and you expect him to somehow turn up in the film after the war is over, and he does, but not in the way Esther or the audience would have expected. The finale is a great apotheosis of love beyond mundane and political limitations, it is a very personal and emotional film, and all the musical scenes make deep impressions. Her old variety director returns to save her from suicide when she can't find work after the war, but then there is the hope of Rudolph. You will not easily forget this film.