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}La Strada (The Road) is a 1954 Italian movie, directed by Federico Fellini. Widely considered one of the greatest films of all time, it received the NYFCC Award in 1956 and the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 1957. Fellini cast his wife, Giulietta Masina in the starring role of young elfin Gelsomina, sold for few coins by her impoverished mother to carnival strong man Zampano, (Anthony Quinn) who makes a living by drawing a crowd to a square, expanding his chest to break a chain, and then passing the hat. He is physically and emotionally cruel, and viciously trains her as both his sidekick and sexual conquest. Gelsomina has a bird-like quality, delicate and strangely beautiful, as well as a prophetic ability to predict the weather, yet she is unable to avoid the brutish Zampano's fits of ineffable rage and violence. Along the road they encounter ‘'The Fool, (Richard Basehart) a circus acrobat and clown who teaches ‘Gelsomina' that there might be more to life than her servitude to Zampano''.
*Criterion Collection essay by Peter Matthews
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