Mamma Roma: Motherhood and Myth in the History of Civilization

 

Colleen Marie Ryan

Indiana University

 

    The first period of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s cinema, that of the Roman borgata, includes Accattone, Mamma Roma, and La ricotta.[1] These films contrast the notions of “prehistory” and history as represented by the subprole­tarian and bourgeois classes of Rome. Pasolini himself explained:

 

. . . le caratteristiche del sottoproletario sono preisto­riche, sono addiritura precristiane. . . . Praticamente il mondo psicologico del sottoproletario è preistorico, mentre il mondo borghese è evidentemente il mondo della storia. (Fioravanti 19)

 

His view of “prehistoric” living as opposed to life in the historical present portrays two universes that are tempo­rally coexistent, but spatially and culturally distinct. While the subproletarians who inhabit the urban outskirts are perceived as an instinctual and irrational population, the middle-class inhabitants of the city center are charac­terized by their adherence to the laws of “ratio” and con­sumer ideology. The juxtaposition of these two worlds is one of the many contradictions inherent in Pasolini’s po­etics and lends itself to a binary narrative structure in his early films.

     Mamma Roma, for example, is a story of a mother and son’s conflicting environments and contrasting fates. The coexistence, however, of Mamma Roma’s new petty-bourgeois ideals with Ettore’s deep-seated tie to a mythic past proves to be tragic: Ettore must pay a fatal price for his mother’s social ambition. Thus, this film is similar to its counterparts in the trilogy of the borgata in that it treats Pasolini’s ideology of death. This concept is best explained by film scholar, Lino Miccichè as:

 

. . . un ferale disegno che parte dal mondo interiore pasoliniano e ricerca la propria verifica nella rappre­sentazione di una realtà che lo scrittore-cineasta carica di tutta la mitologia del primitivismo innocente e disperatamente vitale, già trasparente dalle prime composizioni poetiche. . . . (“Pasolini, la borgata e la morte” 7)

 

Hence, the leitmotifs of myth and death unite in formu­lating the most decisive aspect of marginal existence and social diversity. They delineate the fate of the subprole­tarian who, by will or by force, encounters the repressive codes of bourgeois history.

    Il senso della morte that pervades Pasolini’s work, says Miccichè, is not so much an historic event as it is an ex­istential one whereby “death is the defining law and the obligatory conclusion of every discourse and of every existence.” (“Pasolini, la borgata e la morte” 10). Fur­thermore, in the essays on cinema in Empirismo eretico, Pasolini stated that actions compose the language of real­ity (199). Thus, if death can be viewed as the arbiter of human action, it can also be considered the ultimate form of reality whose complement is none other than myth. In an interview from 1970, for example, Pasolini told Jean Duflot: “le mythique n’est que l’autre face du réalisme, le faire, l’agire, l’action . . .” (Entretiens 66). In his very personal myth of the borgata Pasolini’s technical and stylistic processes sought to reflect an “epic-religious” view of the world. This view, in turn, rendered sublime the organizational function of editing and coincides with the significance and succession of the human events on screen.

    Nonetheless, in its treatment of myth and death, Mamma Roma also differs significantly from the other debut films because it presents a female protagonist in the role of mother. Pasolini’s concept of woman, from his earliest poetry, focuses on the very essence of mother­hood; the woman-mother symbolizes contemporaneously the locus of life and death, as exemplified by the origi­nally Friulan verse, “Il nini muart” (Il fanciullo morto):

 

Sera luminosa, nel fosso

cresce l’acqua, una donna incinta

cammina per il campo.

Io ti ricordo, Narciso, avei il colore

della sera, quando le campane

suonano a morto. (Pasolini, Bestemmia 15)

 

The author found an irreplaceable source of vitality in the mother-son relationship, and in the poetry of L’usignolo della Chiesa Cattolica (1943–1949) his nostalgia for a prenatal state intensified, becoming more epic and meta­phoric in meaning. In pieces such as “La crocifissione,” for example the poet likened himself to Christ, and thus, his mother to the Madonna:

 

Tutte le piaghe sono al sole

ed Egli muore sotto gli occhi

di tutti: perfino la madre

sotto il petto, il ventre, i ginocchi,

guarda il Suo corpo patire. (Bestemmia 376–77)

 

This dominating sentiment of love for his mother was at the origin of human experience and poetic inspiration for Pasolini. For this reason Mother became synonymous with the notions of Womb and Origin as the exclusive object of his love. She provided the Son (in accordance with the narcissistic current in Pasolini’s poetics) with the promise of return: the re-immersion in a state of inno­cence, or an “uncontaminated” existence prior to bour­geois history.

    With the issues of history and motherhood at hand we can analyze the conflict that Mamma Roma’s origins and cultural formation impose on her efforts to effect a net social change in her life. Through the series of twice-oc­curring narrative moments throughout the film Mamma Roma’s movement and actions reflect a decline in her physical and emotional energies. This deterioration coin­cides with a gradual increase in social awareness based on moral responsibility for her social condition. The resulting tension renders her efforts for social advancement futile. Ultimately, it confirms the woman’s inability to gain an identity in history any different from her original one. Furthermore, considering the author’s valorization of ori­gin and the existential importance he attributes to the no­tion of Mother, we can see why, in the end, Mamma Roma does not die, but rather is condemned to remain in the borgata, and to contemplate the ideological awareness that led to her son’s demise.

    Mamma Roma’s entrance in the opening sequence is a parody of the borgataro’s existence. She is accompanied by three pigs in costume, potentially a pimp, a prostitute, and a child: “Entrano come un manipolo di matti, di con­dannati a morte, come un balletto” (Pasolini, Accattone 241). The sequence unfolds in three parts, the first of which shows Mamma Roma diametrically opposed to the “sacrilega mescolanza” of wedding guests. The “shot/reerse shot” structure of this scene delineates two narrative spaces within a single cosmos, indicative of the film’s two urban settings, one central and one marginal. The second segment, summarized by the four-part song it contains, establishes Mamma Roma’s identity as a pros­titute with obligations to Carmine. Lastly, part three re­veals the “desperate vitality” that is reserved for her ma­ternal role. At a certain point she has an unexpected outburst: “I fiji! Ma che so’ i fiji?” (Accattone 245). Al­luding to Ettore, Mamma Roma embraces a small boy and asks him if he loves his mother. She even makes a fake mustache to provoke a positive response. Twirling round and round with the boy in her arms, she laughs whole-heartedly and falls on the floor.

    The same twirling motif opens sequence two in which Ettore appears for the first time. While seated on a carni­val ride with his hands on his “grembo,” the sixteen year-old’s presence reconfirms the mother-son tie. He is de­fined through Mamma Roma’s subjective glance as the chosen means through which she intends to realize her petty-bourgeois dreams. For this reason, when the teen suddenly disappears, Mamma Roma is visibly struck by a profound sense of anguish.

    Ettore, having jumped off the carousel, is filmed from behind as he walks back into the narrative space to inter­act with his burino companions.[2]

    His movement contrasts with Mamma Roma’s brisk and frontal advancement, indicating her impetus in mov­ing forward in history towards the new life she has planned. Mamma Roma follows her son in the first of two “pedinamenti.” Hence, while Ettore moves within or to­wards his marginal origins,

 

“Mamma Roma avanza . . . , contro la funebre luce domenicale. . . . Guarda davanti a sè ansiosa. . . . Nel piccolo spiazzo, fuori dal mondo, in una luce ch’è quasi irreale, tanto è triste, contro le pareti di sassi delle vecchie case, tra cadaverici cespugli, sono sparsi i carosielli. . . . Mamma Roma avanza, guar­dando. . . .” (Accattone 249)

 

Although Mamma Roma advances, what lies before her is ancient and unreal. The funereal light and cadaver-like vegetation are reminders of her ancestral background that oppose and prevent her successful immersion with the historical present.

    When, towards the end of the film, Mamma Roma fol­lows and spies on Ettore again, the boy himself is imbued with signs of fatality and opposition: “È Ettore che tos­sisce, allontanandosi: tossisce forte e si piega sulla vita” (Accattone 339).

    Likewise, there is a noteworthy change in Mamma Roma’s behavior from the first time she follows her son to the second, which, in turn, reflects her inner state. In the first case, while at the beginning of her journey in effecting a social upgrade for the two of them, she is “felice, ubriaca e curiosa a pedinarlo” (Accattone 250), and the episode concludes with the reunion of mother and son. In contrast, in the second case, she is “piena di inutile ansia e dolore,” (Accattone 339) and the episode marks their separation forever.

    A similar pattern is discernible during Mamma Roma’s two nighttime walks. The first time she leaves her prosti­tution beat, for instance, she is happy and determined: “Si alza di scatto, e cammina in avanti, per il grande viale notturno . . . l’intera sequenza è una sola camminata: è l’impeto inarrestabile di Mamma Roma che se ne va” (Accattone 262). Mamma Roma laughs incessantly as she speaks in monologue form with the marginal characters who, almost rhythmically, step in and out of her narrative space. She is vociferous as she jokes about her past mis­fortune and even dances with the others before the scene fades to black.

    However, the second time that she leaves the same nocturnal location, now referred to as the “Avenue of Lost Souls,” Mamma Roma shows signs of fatigue and resig­nation. As indicated in the screenplay

 

 “Mamma Roma cammina, davanti a loro, viene avanti, pedala. . . . E comincia la lunga carrellata su quella nuova tappa del suo calvario. . . . Intermina­bile. . . .” (Accattone 332)

 

 “Muta,” “triste,” and “assente,” she walks and evokes pity from her colleague, Biancofiore. Whereas the influ­ences of alcohol during the wedding banquet and the first night walk provoked excessive laughter, the cognac that she drinks this time incites a different verbal outburst. Again she speaks with the characters that merge into her chiaroscuro, almost surreal space. This time, however, she weaves talk of moral responsibility into the stories about her origins. Interestingly, the facts about her past, especially her marriage, do not coincide with those pro­nounced during the first night walk. This ambiguity is the author’s way of generalizing, on a socio-existential level, the mystery of origin tout court. And in the case of Mamma Roma, it elevates the story of her past to the level of myth (Girini 75).

    Futhermore, the substantial lengths of these two noctur­nal “carrellate” underscore the importance of their the­matic and stylistic content. The first one, lasting 3'30" captures Mamma Roma in the midst of her bourgeois en­thusiasm. She bids farewell to her past as a prostitute and looks before her, never behind. The scene that follows shows Mamma Roma visiting a parish priest through whom she hopes to find a job or “sistemazione” for Et­tore. The second walk, lasting 4'22", instead, marks the onset of Mamma Roma’s defeat. Although she tries to make light of her ill-fortune a second time, her laughs are imbued with anguish and combined with acute physical pain. In addition, Mamma Roma no longer walks the straight-line path of history. While the camera still cap­tures her in a frontal manner, she swaggers a bit on the road ahead that now has some curves and semi-circular detours. In the scene that follows the second night walk (#35), Mamma Roma argues with Ettore and sees him for the last time.

    In both instances Mamma Roma’s movement away from the past is countered by a growing awareness of in­dividual and collective responsibility. The long take for Pasolini is a subjective shot, and “il massimo limite rea­listico di ogni tecnica audiovisiva” (Pasolini, Empirismo 237). Mamma Roma’s reality, therefore, is expressed by her actions and movement. Yet these actions only acquire a sense when completed and actions are only complete when the future no longer exists—that is, with death. Mamma Roma therefore is constantly in motion as she tries to overcome her past and grapple with the desired future. As a result, her actions lack unity. Given that death, according to Pasolini, is what allows our lives to have meaning, it is the finality of Ettore’s actions and the conclusion of his own trajectory that gives sense to the lives of both marginal characters (Pasolini, Empirismo 241).

    A third marginal character reappears throughout the film, reconfirming Mamma Roma’s indelible roots in a marginal past, and marking her declining will to interfere with the course of events in her life. Although she is dis­turbed by Carmine’s first return, she hides it: “. . . fa bene l’indifferente e quasi la divertita” (Accattone 258). The second time that Carmine presents himself at her door, however, she is exasperated and can no longer pretend. Worn down from her unsuccessful endeavors, Mamma Roma acts instinctively in self defense. In doing so, she closes the door on Carmine, but not in time to keep him from entering. She cries and then composes herself long enough to offer him food and a place to stay. When Car­mine does not accept and threatens to reveal the truth about her to Ettore, Mamma Roma reacts with despera­tion and irrational. By violating her bond with Ettore, Carmine threatens the stability of the most profound and certain identity that she has. Consequently, she grabs a knife and tries to kill her oppressor, but to no avail. Ren­dered impotent, she must watch tragedy unravel before her.

    Carmine’s cyclical returns indicate the ineluctability of fate and the relentless influence of one’s origins and past. Mamma Roma’s adherence to the moral laws of the his­torical present cannot be achieved through Ettore because subproletarians, as portrayed by Pasolini, do not know moral laws. Thus, Mamma Roma’s life on the border between two cultural universes is utterly chaotic. In addi­tion, the growing sense of moral consciousness implicit in history prevents her from truly grasping either the rational or irrational part of her being. In the interim, having forced unto Ettore an existence too far from his roots, Mamma Roma loses him.

    Upon receiving the news of his death, Mamma Roma’s movement is characterized by madness and fatality. It is reminiscent of her entrance with the pigs whose move­ment, like in a ballet, tells a story of its own:

 

Mamma Roma si svincola dalle braccia delle dure persone che le hanno portato la notizia e, come una pazza, lascia il banco e si mette a correre . . . corre come una pazza lungo il marciapiede del mercato. . . . Corre nel baraglio del sole, come una cavalla impaz­zita. . . . Corre diritta davanti a sè, con un gemito che non riesce a proromperle fuori dal petto. . . . (Accattone 363)

 

Mamma Roma’s neighbors arrive just in time to abort her attempted suicide and final chance to seize the freedom that she has continually been denied. In the end, as if pre­determined, her actions have lead her back to a marginal, subproletarian cosmos like the one in which she began. Mamma Roma is forced to continue her life at the limits of history, identify the cause for her miserable fate. The silent stares in the final sequence reiterate the earlier de­lineation of two urban worlds that are unable to commu­nicate. Although Mamma Roma is the one to violate the laws of her own origins, Ettore lives out the fatal destiny of the Pasolinian borgataro. Mamma Roma does not, and it remains to be seen why.

    In the author’s critique of the civilization of history, the subproletarians’ pre-bourgeois ideology and marginal existence crystallize and preserve the sense of their lives in the form of myth. Within this myth Mamma Roma is not only subproletarian, but also woman. As the symbolic origin of human existence, she does not die; the fruit of her womb, that which was ancestral but alive within her, dies instead. In the author’s words: “Woman represents vitality. Things die and we feel grief, but then vitality comes back again—that’s what woman represents” (Halliday 106). Mythical yet socially real, individual yet collective in its epic confirmation of human existence, the notions of motherhood and origin are the one reference point that does not crumble in this film. It is the primary (and, perhaps, sole) trait that allows for a positive valori­zation of the female figure. It establishes Mamma Roma as an indispensable part of the author’s personal myth regarding a society that, having almost completely ceased to exist, merits rediscovery and reappropriation.

    The frontal filming technique employed by Pasolini, while emphasizing the tragic confrontation between two cultural universes, allows him to explicate his poetics of human existence. He renders sacred the crudest, most physical aspects of the subproletarian world. In the case of Mamma Roma, the use of frontal close-ups against very abstract, black or white backgrounds has the effect of lifting the character from her base social condition to celebrate the purity of her existence. It reconfirms Mamma Roma’s irrefutable identity as mother, inside and outside history, and despite the absence or presence of her son (Pasolini, “Confessioni tecniche” 44).

    The Son, likened to Christ in this film, given the vari­ous figurative references that the prison sequences recall, has been explored rather extensively by scholars. The Womb or “grembo materno” merits no less attention. As Giovanni Giudici states:

 

è l’altro modo dell’ossessione narcissistica comple­mentare a quell’ossessione cristologica che nel film, Il Vangelo secondo Matteo, culminerà nell’imporre a sua madre, Susanna, la parte (e il dolore) della Ma­donna. (Pasolini, Bestemmia xvii)

 

Hence, the mother, Mamma Roma, was compelled to wit­ness both Ettore’s birth and death. She had to survive and mourn her Christ-son who died “crucified” in solitary confinement. She, too, has something to learn from her son’s martyrdom.

    As mother, Mamma Roma is the locus of Ettore’s be­ginning and end. Her survival provides Ettore’s death with an epic dimension based on the promise of return to a primordial existence. The repeated crosscuts between
Mamma Roma and Ettore in the film’s last ten sequences, their reciprocal invocations of each other, and the dolly that caresses Ettore with “maternal sweetness” are the final stylistic elements that articulate the insoluble nature of their bond (Magrelli 54). The mother-son relationship embraces the thematic dyads of life and death, pre-history and history and projects the lyrical tension and existential conflict not only in this film, but in Pasolini’s poetic uni­verse as a whole:

 

Fuori del tempo è nato

il figlio e dentro muore. (Pasolini, Bestemmia 409)

 

Works Cited

Duflot, Jean. Entretiens avec Pasolini. Paris: Belfond, 1976.

___. Il sogno del centauro. Roma: Riuniti, 1983.

Ferrero, Niccolo. “Mamma Roma, ovvero, dalla respon­sabilità individuale alla responsabilità collettiva.” Con Pier Paolo Pasolini. Ed. Enrico Magrelli. Roma: Bulzoni, 1977.

Fioravanti, Leonardo, Omar Zulficar, and Nazareno Na­tale. “Una visione del mondo epico-religiosa.” Bianco e nero 6 (1964): 19.

Girini, Daniela. “Mamma Roma” di Pier Paolo Pasolini. Thesis. Università di Pavia, 1987.

Giudici, Giovanni. Preface. Bestemmia. By Pier Paolo Pasolini. Milano: Garzanti, 1995.

Halliday, Jon. Pasolini on Pasolini. London: Thames and Hudson. 1969.

Miccichè, Lino. Introduction. Tutti i film di Pier Paolo Pasolini. Siena: Centro di Studi sul Cinema e sulle Comunicazioni di Massa, 1982.

___. Il cinema italiano degli anni sessanta e oltre. Venezia: Marsilio, 1980.

___. “Pasolini, la borgata e la morte. Un’introduzione a La ricotta.” Roma: Terza Università di Roma, 1996.

___. Mamma Roma—sceneggiatura desunta. Roma: Terza Università di Roma, 1996.

Pasolini, Pier Paolo. Bestemmia. Milano: Garzanti, 1995.

___. Mamma Roma. Dir. Pier Paolo Pasolini. Perf. Anna Magnani, Franco Citti, Ettore Garofalo. Rome, 1962.

___. Accattone, Mamma Roma, Ostia. Milano: Garzanti, 1993.

___. “Mamma Roma.” Alì dagli occhi azzurri. Milano: Garzanti, 1965.

___. Empirismo eretico. Milano: Garzanti, 1972.

___. “Le confessioni tecniche.” Uccellacci e uccellini. Milano: Garzanti, 1966.


[1]Miccichè, Introduction, Tutti i film v–vi. Professor Miccichè has broken down Pasolini’s film into four movements based on thematic and stylistic content. They are the following: the cin­ema of the borgata, the cinema of ideology, the cinema of myth and quartet of (life and of) death.

[2]“Burino” is a term adopted by Pasolini to define that social stratus beneath the subproletarian class that is slowly merging with the postwar petty-bourgeoisie. This term is often used by Romans pejoratively to denote the country people or farmers that are thought of as “primitive” or “backward.”