Cabiria, in the film Nights
of Cabiria, lives a very sad life. She is a prostitute, but still carries an
optimistic and romantic attitude, in search of having a happy, stable life.
What confuses me in the film is that she expects to find the right man for her
by living a life in prostitution, where she knows the men that she deals with
are filth. She even says this when in the car with her pimp and prostitute
friend essentially, saying “Why should I slave over pigs like you!” This to me is a sure tell sign that she should
not be expecting love in this type of profession. Yet she gets her hopes up
with Alberto when he invites her home with him, even after witnessing him fighting,
verbally and physically, with another girl right before she is asked to get in
his car.
I initially thought that she was a very oblivious woman who lived in
denial. In the very beginning, Giorgio robs her and pushes her in the river and
she almost dies. Once she is revived, she is so hung up on her dream of being
in love that she convinces herself that she fell in the water, and she then
goes looking for him. Another problem I saw with the Cabiria character is that
she pushed away people who tried to help her. For example, Wanda is always
concerned for her, from the beginning when she tells her that Giorgio was using
her, to the end when she is confused and concerned that Cabiria is selling her
stuff to be with Oscar. I believe that if Cabiria is miserable because goes
after the people who make her suffer. All she wants in life is to have a man to
love and provide her with a stable life. She is constantly
telling men about how proud she is to own a house, but it is obvious that she wants more.
She
seems to be so obsessed with finding love and affection that she’ll be a prostitute
and be with tons of men to find it, even if they end up hurting her afterwards.
It’s
sad to think that she had no other choice than to take what she could get in life;
that she was unable to be anything else than a prostitute. This is why I found
it to be an overall sad and disappointing movie. Deep down she knows she is
foolish, calling herself a moron at one point in the movie. The fact that she
is aware of this, and that she becomes more hesitant with men upon meeting
Oscar, makes it all the more sad that the man who courts her and respects her
for the first time in her life ends up hurting and leaving her like all the
other men.
I appreciate her perseverance, but it is exhausting to watch someone
go through so many downfalls. Even though this is what life is like
realistically, it does not make it entertaining to watch for almost two hours. I
found the movie to be very disappointing, but I suppose the message was to say
that life goes on. She has been through many heart breaks, but she never gives
up hope, as she walks away at the end of the movie smiling through her tears. It showed us the you’re
going to make mistakes in life and people are going to hurt you, but there are
happy things in life too, like random parading people that circle you in the
streets who can lift you up and help you see the good in life. This theme is a
nice, realistic one to live by in life, but that still doesn’t make the movie
any less frustrating to watch.
By Katie Robinson
I have to disagree with you on your statement that Cabiria lives a very sad life. Yes she is a prostitute and does not find true love, but she is pretty well off with herself. She does have her little house that she has paid for and owns. Many, many people cannot even claim that today. She does seem to be a bit naïve and living in a dreamland, but she is a little more down to earth than a good chunk of Italy when it comes to “miracles.” She understands that miracles do not happen automatically, or is there really even such a thing as miracles?
ReplyDeleteEven though Cabiria is a strong, independent woman in many ways, I do agree that she is a little too hung up on finding true love. Who knows how many men she has been through the same situation with before Giorgio. We only saw two men use her, but what if it happened even more than that? One would think that she would have learned her lesson that many men are just going to use her for her money, especially the kind of men she associates with most often with her job. For a while, many of us thought that Oscar was truly a sincere guy, since he was courting her and taking her to nice places, buying her gifts, etc. But I guess he was just another jerk who decided to take advantage of such an innocent woman. In all honesty, the first encounter with Cabiria was when she was hypnotized and was forced to open up to all the audience about her dreams. She was definitely in a vulnerable state and Oscar took that as his cue.
--Rachel K.
I do not necessarily agree that Cabiria is miserable. Even though she is a prostitute and men do break her heart many of the time, she still has high hopes. She is dancing and singing on the street corner with her friends and manages to keep a smile on her face. I think that many people in this world make the mistakes that Cabiria does. We all want to believe that people are better than they actually are, and she gives these men a chance in hopes to find true love. I have to say that I think it is the men that are miserable instead of Cabiria. They go through their lives treating women as though they are objects. I think the reason she wants a man so bad is so she does not have to prostitute anymore and that she can have someone help change her into a better person; she just makes bad judgments on which man is truly going to love her for her. I think this movie was not disappointing because we see a happy Cabiria at the end of the movie. Through all of her hardship she has never given up hope, which would be easy to do in her case. She breaks a smile through her tears, signifying that everything is going to be okay. I think this gives viewers hope in their lives to never give up on themselves and to know that things could be going worse everyday. The ending was a cliffhanger because we don't actually know what Cabiria is going to do next. Will she be hurt again just like before? As viewers we can only hope she learned her lesson and can learn to love herself.
ReplyDelete-Allison Emery
Group 6; Bethan Parmenter
ReplyDeleteI agree with Rachel K.'s review of Nights of Cabiria and her views on Cabiria and her life. While she did have an unpleasant career, prostitution she did try to make the best of what she had. She had bought her own house, and had it decorated with her belongings and even a pet chicken. Cabiria's mission through out the movie seemed to be trying to find, or make her own "happily ever after". I thought that this was a very brave, yet still naive quest for her. After all of the terrible things she had to witness and do on a daily, or nightly basis she was still so convinced that true love was attainable for anyone. It was heart breaking as a viewer to see her have her heart repeatedly broken my men with cruel intentions, only trying to get money from her and not caring about her well-being. Georgio went to the extend that he nearly killed her when he pushed her in the river while stealing her purse. It is after this scene that viewers realize she deludes herself into thinking mens intentions with her are more pure than they actually are. The one scene in this whole movie that I thought evoked the most emotion was the final one where she is walking down the darkening road after being robbed yet again by a man she considered her lover. As she looks into the camera it felt as if she was looking at each viewer indivudally and confirming that she still had hope and would continue to find joy in life and continue her quest for true love and her own happily ever after, even after the being wronged multiple times.