Above and Below the Line
Women’s labour in postwar Italian cinema
Many women worked in the post-war Italian film industry. While there were few female directors and producers, women performed various other roles such as script supervisor, assistant director, costume designer, hairdresser, make-up artist and even film editor. They often worked in difficult circumstances due to the numerical and cultural preponderance of men and a division of labour based on gender discrimination which relegated women to secondary roles.
This division was reinforced by a practice characterising the organisation of labour in the sphere of film production, which is evident in the very structure of a film budget sheet. From the early years of the Hollywood industry, it was customary to draw a line that made a clear distinction between artistic costs – to which high value was attributed – that were found above the line, and technical-production costs, which were listed below it. Even today, when referring to creative roles, the expression ‘above the line’ is used, while organisational and technical ones are labelled ‘below the line’.
This exhibition pays tribute to some women who worked in various sectors of Italian cinema and, in the case of Anna Baldazzi, shows how news photography was intimately related to the ‘behind the scenes’ of film production. Even if they remained in the shadows, many of them contributed decisively to the development and international fame of Italian cinema between the 1940s and the 1970s.
In that period – if actresses are excluded – ‘above the line’ women (directors, screenwriters, producers) were a tiny minority compared to their male colleagues. Among the personalities present in the exhibition, only Suso Cecchi d’Amico won acknowledgement from the industry and acquired wider recognition. All the others,
those who were ‘below the line’, only in very rare cases received forms of gratification equal to the dedication with which they performed their profession. Yet, through the exercise of their imagination and inventiveness, they challenged and sometimes practically dissolved the restrictive networks operating in cinema that formally separated the artistic creation of a film from its production and organization.
