just watch it!

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

After watching "Rome, Open City" I was really looking forward to "Stromboli". But wow...what a whiff!Awwww, "poor" Karen!! A miserable woman complains about her miserable fortune for a miserable 107 minutes. Ingrid Bergman plays a very convincing American brat who consents to marry and live with a simple-minded fisherman. Her character uses the line, "What did I do?!? It's not my fault!" at least three times, and finds a way to whimper and cry in every scene. Because no one likes her, she tries to escape the small fishing town, but gets stuck at the top of an active volcano. Then Karen vomits out the most pitiable prayer to God, more tears, and then––"The End". Didn't get it. And I won't try to get it. Let this film go to sleep and die, as it should have back in 1950. Blah.

Stromboli is a movie that comes from the post World War II neo-realist school. It is not for a modern mass audience, but if you like movies like The Bicycle Thief or Wild Strawberries, this movie is worth watching. I found Ingrid Bergman's performance superb as the well educated and literate wife of an Italian fisherman, rescued from a refugee camp. Once this refined young woman finds herself on a lonely island off the southern coast of Italy with nothing in common with the local people, she is at her wit's end. She will do anything to get away. The young woman tries to befriend people but every time she does, she seems to run afoul of the local customs. She pays a visit to a local seamstress who is shunned and this causes her to be guilty by association. When she decorates her home, her husband is upset by the removal of religious objects and old family photos. Even when going to church, she is stared at by everyone in the congregation. She finds some comfort in the priest who seems to understand her predicament and counsels her to save money for a time in the future when they can get away to a place that is more hospitable for them. This is not much consolation for her. At one point, the whole village is driven off the island by the eruption of a volcano that stands only a short distance away. The filming of this natural disaster is extremely effective and viewers feel they are in the midst of the eruption. For her, it is another reason to abandon the island forever. We feel that in some ways she has grown into a more mature person as a result of her trials; however, the gulf between her comfort zone and life on the island is too wide. The ending is neither hopeful nor despairing, and we can only imagine what might happen.

As Wikipedia has it, 'The phrase "fish out of water" refers to a person in an unfamiliar setting or happening as a result of being in an unfamiliar setting.' No other movie has demonstrated this concept to me as much as Stromboli. (Tuna, in particular :^).Ingrid Bergman had changed waters several times before. After a number of movies in Sweden, she went to the US for quite some career (think Casablanca or Notorious), and around the time of her work in Hitchcock's "Under Capricorn" she wrote a surprising application letter to Roberto Rosselini, asking if he could use her.He could (in more ways than one), and Stromboli was their first movie together - a rare mixture of neo-realist quasi-documentary and highly emotional melodrama, with less than the little realism such pieces usually have. I found it very striking (with some slower passages), and the end really struck me in the stomach.The volcanic island of Stromboli and its people get more unfamiliar to Karin as she looks around. Her reactions are puzzling to shocking, but it's not that that doesn't make sense in a situation like hers. Disappointed and ultimately locked in by her husband, she lives up to heroine status by trying to escape - walk over the volcano, baby in womb, to the other side of the island, losing most belongings on the way. Final prayer close to the volcano top, THE END.I tried to make sense of this ending. (1 - happy:) She is soon after saved and tells her story? (2 - unhappy:) She dies? Whatever. Some people wrote this movie is dated. Of course it is - 1950! I think a movie is best seen with some empathy for the time it was made. 57 years is a long time during which many things changed. However similarities, comparing films of 1950 and 2000 is less than comparing apples and oranges. (The romantic music is of course sometimes overdone in my "modern" ears).One film I'd vaguely compare it to is Zorba the Greek - foreigner getting to know old-time life on a Mediterranean island, especially the status of women there... I can't say I loved Stromboli, more that it awed me. Terrifically. And I will sure watch it again.

This film was a very controversial in 1950, mainly because of Ingrid Bergman's personal life which was talked about from every pulpit in the country and was actually banned by the Catholic Church. However, in today's standard of living, this would not have made much difference, we hear about such things going on in Hollywood all the time. Ingrid Bergman,(Karin), " Cactus Flower",'69, played a very frustrated young gal who tried to escape from one place and married a fisherman and witnessed a horrible smelly fishy scene with large tuna being hauled into small fishing boats. Karin also had the experience of having to go out into the sea in order to avoid being burned up by a volcano that was pouring down lava into her town. Poor Karin also gets locked up in her own home and starts flirting with a local man to help her escape. Karin winds up climbing up a huge mountain without a suitcase and only the clothes on her back. Ingrid Bergman gave an outstanding performance that will be long remembered. Great Film to view in Black & White.