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giant publicity poster for the aperitif Cinzano, another symbol of this new lifestyle, is
conspicuous at the roadside where the prostitute works. These self-conscious directorial
insertions underline the characters' total non-involvement in the country's new economic
wealth and urban lifestyle, in which consumerism was becoming prevalent.
The insertion of cinematic innovation
Bertolucci's divergence from other stylistic elements of neorealism, such as its 'free moving
documentary style of photography', its 'non-interventionist approach to film directing' and an
'avoiding of complex editing', (Shiel, 2006: 1-2) reflects the director's eagerness to
experiment with the modes of film-making emerging from France, techniques that privileged
the visibility of cinematic devices. This tendency emerges from Bertolucci's idiosyncratic
camera use and from forms of editing based on space-time ellipses, which, besides sustaining
a predominantly descriptive aesthetic, ensure that viewers are constantly aware of the artifice
of the cinematic medium. This process is exemplified in several sequences; unconventional
camera movement and editing occur in the scene where Francolicchio gives his comb to the
homosexual park visitor. The camera position is frontal and the action of the movement is
from right to the left, so when the man returns the comb, a reverse movement would be
expected; instead, the movement is again from right to left. The aim of this technique is
clearly to startle viewers and disrupt the staged fiction.
There are frequent graphic clashes as cuts alternate landscapes and interiors, and
heads and bodies (such as the cut replacing the horizontal line of the close-up of Canticchia's
head with the vertical lines of the close-up of Bustelli's crossed legs). In other cases, the
montage produces moments of time-space discontinuity, by skipping entire stages of Bustelli
and Esperia's journey around the city outskirts to collect money; this is typified by a sudden
jarring cut from a close-up of Bustelli and Esperia in a car to a longer shot of him pursuing
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