My Story [antikvár]

Prologue She came out into the cool air of Hollywood's La Cienega Boulevard, and she felt dazed. She looked at the glowing neon, the headlights of the passing traffic, and taking Petter's arm she urged him toward the playbill outside the movie theatre, saying, 'Petter, we must get this director's name straight. If there is such a man who can put this on the screen, he must be an absolutely heavenly human being!' Her eyes quickly scanned the poster and caught one end-credit: 'Music by Rossellini.' 'God Almighty,' she exclaimed, 'he's even written the music!' Rarely can anyone look back and identify the exact moment of no return, the precise moment of utter and fundamental change. Yet because of one film, Rome— Open City, Ingrid Bergman's life changed. Roberto Rossellini's life changed. Doctor Petter Lindstrom's life changed. And children were given life. As she says: The realism and simplicity of Open City was heart-shocking. No one looked like an actor and no one talked like an actor. There was darkness and shadows, arid sometimes you couldn't hear, and sometimes you couldn't even see it. But that's the way it is in life you can't always see and hear, but you know that something almost beyond understanding is going on. It was as if they'd removed the walls from the houses and rooms, and you could see inside them. And it was more than that. It was as if you were there, involved in what was going on, and you wept and bled for them. On that spring evening in 1948 when Ingrid Bergman, vii