The Rose Tattoo **** (1955, Anna Magnani, Burt Lancaster, Marisa Pavan) – Classic Movie Review 7,544

The triple Oscar-winning 1955 film The Rose Tattoo stars a triumphant Anna Magnani, who acts her socks off as the Italian-extracted peasant widow Serafina Delle Rose, in this attractive screen version of Tennessee Williams’s 1951 play.

Director Daniel Mann’s triple Oscar-winning 1955 film The Rose Tattoo stars a triumphant Anna Magnani, who acts her socks off as the Italian-extracted peasant widow Serafina Delle Rose, living in the Italian quarter of an American Gulf town in Louisiana, finding solace in the sweaty, beefy arms of rose-tattooed Alvaro Mangiacavallo (Burt Lancaster), whom she sees as the reincarnation of her beloved truck driver husband, who was killed by police while smuggling.

Magnani won the Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role, won Best Actress – Drama at the Golden Globes and won Best Foreign Actress at the BAFTA Film Awards. Along with the film’s three Oscar wins, there were five other nominations, including Best Picture.

This film version of Tennessee Williams’s 1951 play delivers the goods in terms of emotion and atmosphere and drama. But, towering above it all are the impressive Best Actress in a Leading Role Oscar-winning histrionics from Magnani, for whom Williams had written the play, though the Italian star had not been confident enough to perform it in English on the Broadway stage. She also won the New York Critics and British Film Academy awards. Lancaster is very solid and loyal in support of the star.

Cinematographer James Wong Howe also took an Oscar for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White, and a third Oscar went to the Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White (for Hal Pereira, Tambi Larsen, Sam Comer, Arthur Krams ). Marisa Pavan was nominated as Best Actress in a Supporting Role, and accepted Magnani’s Oscar on her behalf at the awards ceremony. However Pavan won the Golden Globe as Best Supporting Actress.

Also in the cast are Ben Cooper, Jo Van Fleet, Virginia Grey, Sandro Giglio, Mimi Aguglia, Florence Sundstrom and Dorrit Kelton.

Maureen Stapleton played the 1951 stage role of Serafina to acclaim and she also originated Lady Torrance in Williams’s Orpheus Descending, a role Magnani also played on film in The Fugitive Kind.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7,544

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