Smart Alice Blog: Photography & Curation

Directed by Roberto Rossellini
Starring Ingrid Bergman
Released in 1950
You can stream Stromboli on the Criterion Channel
A film critique by Alice Gebura

Identity and Narrative

Identity is the essence of who we are. The process of revealing that essence is often the work of an individual lifetime. On a political level, identity is the compilation of beliefs and values established by a group and projected through its structure and history. Who we are or might be is of perennial interest because identity often drives what we do and why.

Numerous scholars have emphasized the connection between narrative and the formation of identity:

“Narratives have always been central to how humans make sense of themselves and the world around them. It is a key mechanism through which identity is shaped, negotiated, and performed across personal, social, and digital contexts.”1

I look at Stromboli, a film written and directed by Roberto Rossellini. Stromboli is the story of Karin, a lost soul who has profoundly endured the violence of WWII. Existing within a world of violence, she is a woman whose survival tactics during the brutality of war have created her spiritual poverty at the opening of the film. She must somehow find peace and a better way to cope in this world. Stromboli exploits the concept of narrative on two levels. First, it depicts the collapse of a woman’s internal narrative, or constructed identity. Second, it uses the traditional resurrection narrative from mythology as the process through which Karin’s identity is recalibrated.

The Resurrection Story

In his essay “Breaking Open” Buddhist teacher and Unitarian minister Doug Kraft writes:

“Transformation is a popular word these days used to refer to spiritual growth. It implies that we change radically as we grow, like lead turning to gold. I don’t like the word because it is misleading. From the perspective of the ego, growth seems to involve changing from one thing into something very different. But from a deeper perspective, we do not really change. That which is deep within us emerges in our awareness.”2

He goes on to describe external factors such as social attitudes and conditioning that influence, perhaps even prevent, our ability to know our core essence.  Kraft posits that until we can differentiate between identity states and who we truly are, we live in an induced trance that is emotionally crippling. At some point the pain of a particular identity state overrides whatever comfort or security has been gained by it. When the old self is abandoned, the next iteration emerges. Paradoxically the next iteration is not something “new” but something elemental. Something essential and true is found or recovered.

This cyclical process, similar to the story of the rebirth of the Phoenix, is reflected in the resurrection story, one of the oldest stories in history. The first known resurrection story, “Inanna’s Descent to the Underworld,” is part of the first extant written library, the 7^th century BC Library of Ashurbanipal.  There are many subsequent resurrection stories throughout history such as the Greek myth of Persephone, the Christian Easter story, and the Norse myth of Odin’s sacrifice – to name a few.

In one interpretation, the life-death-rebirth cycle is an allegory for the seasons.  In another interpretation it represents psychological and spiritual transformation.  The trajectory of the resurrection story is basically as follows:

• There is an initiation event that launches a journey or an ordeal.
• The journey is typically a descent, literal or metaphorical, into “hell.” It is characterized by darkness and suffering.
• Some kind of breakage – of the ego, for example – occurs as a result.
• The reassembly of the breakage is the resurrection.

A brief summary of the story of “Inanna’s Descent to the Underworld” begins with the goddess Inanna’s wish to travel to the realm of the dead that is ruled by her sister, Ereshkigal. Her supposed reason is to attend the funeral of her brother-in-law, but Ereshkigal suspects Inanna wants to take over. To travel to the underworld Inanna must pass through seven gates on the way. At each gate, in a ritual of humiliation, she loses a piece of her regal clothing, i.e. some of her power. By the time she reaches the underworld she is naked and powerless. The suspicious Ereshkigal turns her into a corpse and hangs her on a hook to rot. Inanna is rescued when a friend sends two spirits to offer empathy to the suffering Ereshkigal. In gratitude, Ereshkigal releases Inanna’s corpse. The two spirits revive Inanna and she returns from her journey as cosmically complete. It goes on and on, but that’s the gist of it.

Stromboli, Terra di Dio

Karin’s psychological journey begins in a WWII refugee camp on mainland Italy where she is in a state of limbo. She is eager to move beyond the horrors of the war and her notorious past that includes being a Nazi collaborator. She is an operator jockeying for an opportunity to leave the camp by whatever means it takes. An opportunity presents itself in Antonio who is “crazy about her.”  She hears his serenade and when we see them together they are separated by the camp’s barbed wire fence. They try to kiss but the fence is a barrier between them. This physical divide symbolizes the painful class and cultural divide that defines their relationship.

When the tactics of lying and manipulation fail in the emigration office, Karin resorts to another tactic, seduction. Her unprincipled opportunism is partly understandable due to the circumstances of war, but things will not end well. The whole-tone scale motif played by harp and flute in the background bodes ill. This haunting motif is introduced as Karin and Antonio marry and set off for his hometown on the volcanic island of Stromboli.

From the wedding scene we cut to a ship sailing toward the horizon and then a close-up of Karin and Antonio on deck.  The sailing sequence brings us further and further out to sea, eventually we see only the ship surrounded by sky and sea. I am reminded of the River Styx in the Persephone myth. While Karin thinks she’s headed for an island paradise, she is being ferried to the underworld. So begins Karin’s psychic “descent.”

The underworld analogy materializes as a landscape of black sand and rocks with the ominous volcano simmering in the background. There is little vegetation, mostly scrub and cacti. The severe geometries of the town’s eerie stone buildings are empty and silent.  Throughout the arrival scene we see Karin become more and more perturbed as she realizes what she has gotten herself into. She demands to be taken away from this island. She is too good for this “uncivilized” place, she’s used to better things. She is angry, she cries. A baby wails in the background as if to equate Karin’s emotional age with tantrums. These scenes are progressively lit with more and more contrast. Deep shadows cast against the white walls, characteristic of the lighting in film noir. The robe she wears at night has wide stripes like a prison uniform. She wanders around the maze-like village crying “I want to get out.” Without the money to leave, she is literally a prisoner. Her differences with Antonio and the villagers increase her alienation. The local priest offers advice but no respite.

Karin is experiencing a ritual of humiliation similar to that in the myth of Inanna. As Inanna passed through the seven gates on the way to the underworld, she lost her clothing- symbolizing the loss of her power. Karin’s powers are depleted one by one as petulance, demands, anger, crying and seduction meet a dead end.

Karin exists in a world of violence. The violence of the world war has ended but again and again Karin is confronted with the violence of men and nature. Her husband beats her and tries to control her. She recoils at the sadistic scene between the ferret and the rabbit.  The mattanza creates a savage death trap for the struggling tuna. The bloodied water splashes Karin in a violent nod to Christian baptism: “dying with Christ and being reborn.” Then the volcano explodes. Rocks reign from the sky, clouds of noxious gasses billow forth. Lava and steam engulf the landscape. Karin is at the end of her rope. Antonio locks her in the house when she tries to leave. Her ingenuity and seductive powers seem to get her out of a mess once again in her rendez-vous with the lighthouse keeper.

Her intent to escape by trekking across the volcano is a confrontation with hell. Sulfurous gasses choke her, she slides and trips on the steep terrain. Rossellini executes his characteristic camera work to obliterate any anchor in space, any discernible compass in the landscape. She sheds her suitcase and money purse, even her shoes. In this wretched hellscape that defies human survival, Karin’s willfulness and scheming are useless against the violent power of nature. She is not a corpse on a hook like Inanna, but stripped down to her elemental core. She collapses in utter despair. The billowing gasses subside and she looks up to see the stars, begging God to grant her a little peace.

Emerging

Jungian analyst Clarissa Pinkola Estes would call this the stage of the descent where love is found in the underworld. In Inanna’s story this is represented by the two spirits sent down to rescue her. Remember – they did so by empathizing with Ereshkigal who then released Inanna in gratitude. In other words it was kindness, not force of will or violence, that freed Inanna.  According to Estes, “This loving presence waits and watches for the wandering seeker…It is called a little flicker or light or insight, a presentment, or a presence.”³ It can take many forms, here it is the light of the stars.

Karin submits to the cosmos and the old Karin “dies.” When she wakes up with the daylight she feels peaceful, saying, “No I can’t go back. I don’t want to. They’re horrible. It’s all horrible, but I’m even worse.”

“Dio! Mio Dio! Aiutami! Dammi la forza, la comprensione, e il coraggio!”

At last Karin confronts herself. She asks for spiritual help, strength and courage. She has emerged from her psychic descent, the breaking of her ego. As the broken pieces of Karin’s identity are reassembled and reshaped, she takes responsibility for herself with the knowledge of a transcendent presence. In writing the initial idea for Stromboli, Rossellini said:

“Suddenly the woman understands the value of the eternal truth which rules human lives; she understands the mighty power of her who possesses nothing, this extraordinary strength which procures complete freedom. In reality she becomes another St. Francis. An intense feeling of joy springs out from her heart, an immense joy of living.”4

In response to the critics’ and audiences’ complaint about the lack of a traditional resolution to the story, Rossellini wrote:

“I don’t know. That would be the beginning of another film. The only hope for Karin is to have a human attitude toward something, at least once…There’s a turning point in every human experience in life… My endings are turning points. Then it begins again. But as for what it is that begins, I don’t know.”5

This last quote reflects the cycle of birth-death-rebirth that structures the resurrection story. Stromboli is the story of a person whose spirit has been sullied by violence and war. At the end of the film Karin is again in a state of limbo ie not knowing where she is going. With this ambiguity Rossellini refrains from moralizing.6  But Karin and we the audience trust that now she will follow some path that is right for her and with a different perspective.

NOTES

1. Hnit, Hussein and Almanna, Ali. “Constructing identity through narratives: Personal, social, and digital dimensions.” Social Sciences & Humanities Open (Elsevier: 12, 2025).
2. I heard this essay for the first time as a sermon delivered by Doug Kraft at the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church, Ashby, Massachusetts in 1994. I asked for a printed copy. Although Doug has published numerous books, I am not aware of an instance where this particular essay is published.
3. Estes, Clarissa Pinkola, Women Who Run with the Wolves (New York: Ballantine Books, 1992),
4. Brunette, Peter, Roberto Rossellini (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 110.
5. Brunette, Peter, Roberto Rossellini (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 126.
6. Because Rossellini had a contract with Hollywood, Hollywood controlled the American release of the film. They ruined it with their editing and they changed the ending. In the Hollywood version Karin goes back to her husband like a good little wife. This ending turns the film into a moral tale of marital fidelity and obedience ie it takes away Karin’s power.