Examining over twenty key works of the period, Vital Crises in Italian Cinema identifies and explores the major thematic crises at the heart of seminal films produced by the likes of Vittorio De Sica, Luchino Visconti, Michael Antonioni, and Federico Fellini.
Vital Crises in Italian Cinema is characterized by an extremely sensitive attention to aesthetic issues. It is one of the very few books on Italian cinema that manages to put politics and art, film and society, together intelligently. Its new epilogue brings it ahead to another important milestone in the development of Italian film history.