Watch Miracolo a Milano (1951)

 

Watch Miracolo a Milano (1951)
Italian Film, Comedy, Fantasy
English title: Miracle in Milan

Cannes Film Festival, 1951 & 2019: Winner: Grand Prix (1951), Official Selection: Cannes Classics (2019)
Berlin International Film Festival, 1952- Official Selection
Locarno International Film Festival, 1988- Official. Selection
National Board of Review, 1952- Winner: Top Foreign Films
BAFTA Awards, 1953- Nominee: Best Film from any Source, Best Foreign Actor
100 most important Italian Films

Vittorio De Sica's 1951 film, Miracolo a Milano (Miracle in Milan), stands as a unique and enchanting outlier in the canon of Italian Neorealism. Co-written with his frequent collaborator Cesare Zavattini (based on Zavattini's novel Totò il Buono), the film deftly welds the movement's dedication to social issues and real-world settings with an extraordinary burst of fantasy, resulting in a poignant, satirical, and ultimately uplifting fable.  More on Wikipedia or Mubi

The film follows the life of Totò (played by Francesco Golisano), a relentlessly cheerful and open-hearted orphan. Found as a baby in a cabbage patch by the kind old woman Lolotta (Emma Gramatica), he is raised with an irrepressible optimism that endures even after her death and his eventual release from an orphanage. Cast out into the impoverished, post-WWII Milan, Totò settles in a windswept shantytown on the city's outskirts, a vast encampment of indigent citizens making homes out of refuse. >>>WATCH TRAILER<<<

From Shantytown to Fairytale

Totò's natural goodness and organizational skills transform the squatter colony into a thriving, organized community complete with named streets and a central square. This initial section of the film is pure, observational Neorealism, showcasing the resilience and collective spirit of the poor. The community finds its joy in small, shared miracles—like a ray of sun on a cold morning or the construction of a beautiful, but makeshift, piazza.

The narrative shifts dramatically when oil is discovered beneath the camp. Suddenly, the forgotten wasteland becomes a coveted commodity. The wealthy, pompous industrialist Mr. Mobbi (Guglielmo Barnabò) swoops in to acquire the land, intent on evicting the squatters with the help of a phalanx of police.

The Intervention of Magic

Faced with eviction and the crushing weight of capitalist greed, the film pivots into full-blown fantasy. The ghost of Totò's adoptive mother, Lolotta, appears and bestows upon him a magical white dove, granting him the power to make wishes come true.

The dove’s arrival precipitates a series of miraculous and often comical events. Totò grants wishes for both necessities and extravagant luxuries, satirically highlighting the dawn of Italy's "economic miracle" and rising consumerism. However, the true miracle is one of fellowship, as Totò uses the dove to defend his friends from the police and Mobbi's increasingly aggressive forces.

A Flying Escape

The film’s unforgettable climax is a spectacular piece of visual whimsy. The forces of authority finally corner the shantytown dwellers, but before they can be taken away (ostensibly to prison), Totò grants one final, desperate wish: to fly away to a place where "goodness and happiness exist."

In a final, breathtaking sequence utilizing groundbreaking special effects for the time, the entire community escapes by soaring over the spires of the Milan Cathedral on borrowed broomsticks, fleeing the harsh reality of the earthly world for a place beyond the cold logic of economics and property law.

Miracolo a Milano is an enduring, fascinating work, contrasting the stark realities of poverty and social inequality with the innocent belief in kindness and the supernatural power of hope. It earned the prestigious Grand Prix (now the Palme d'Or) at the 1951 Cannes Film Festival, cementing its place as a cornerstone of post-war Italian cinema.

The Good: Strengths and Merits

The film is generally acclaimed for several artistic and thematic strengths:

• Unique Blend of Genres (Neorealist Fable): Its greatest strength is the bold fusion of the gritty realism of post-WWII Italian cinema (location shooting, non-professional actors, focus on poverty) with genuine fantasy, whimsy, and comedy. This blend allows for a lighter, more hopeful, and utterly unique exploration of social issues than De Sica's previous, somber works like Bicycle Thieves.

• Heartfelt Social Commentary and Humanism: The film is a powerful, if allegorical, critique of capitalism and class exploitation. It champions the "Christian—or simply human—sense of fellowship" among the poor, depicting their ability to build a dignified community from nothing. The contrast between the greedy capitalist Mr. Mobbi and the selfless protagonist Totò is a sharp, effective satire.

• Uplifting Optimism: Unlike the tragic despair of many Neorealist films, Miracle in Milan offers an irresistible sense of joy and optimism. Totò's pure, unwavering goodness and his refusal to be corrupted by cynicism or greed provide a refreshing, spiritual center for the narrative.

• Cinematic Imagination and Special Effects: The film is visually arresting, featuring moments of sublime cinematic poetry, such as the scene where the homeless vie for a single shaft of sunlight. The final, fantastical escape on broomsticks—while primitive by modern standards—is an iconic, exhilarating, and perfectly executed sequence of grassroots escapism.

  The Not So Good: Criticisms and Weaknesses

  The same elements that made the film a unique success also drew specific criticisms, particularly from within Italy:

• Uneasy Tonal Mix: For some critics and viewers, the abrupt shift from grounded social realism to outright supernatural fantasy was too jarring or "uneasy." It diluted the strict tenets of Neorealism, which sought to depict reality exactly as it was.

• Oversimplification and Sentimentality: The relentless optimism of the hero, Totò, and the magical resolution were seen by some as overwhelmingly sentimental and a form of escapism that sidestepped the true, harsh nature of poverty. The film's message that "goodness will save us" was sometimes viewed as an overly simple or naive solution to complex socio-economic problems.

• Political Ambiguity: The film's political satire was too ambiguous for some. It was criticized by some on the Left for being too spiritual or quasi-religious, and by some on the Right for its clear anti-capitalist, pro-poor stance. This made it "unclassifiable" and prevented it from gaining the immediate, unanimous favor in Italy that De Sica's earlier films had received.

• Dated Special Effects: While groundbreaking for 1951, the visual effects for the more fantastical moments (like the flying sequence) rely on techniques like rear projection that can now look dated or crude to a modern audience.

Full Film (English subtitles)