'Finally Dawn's Storytelling Instincts Squander an Interesting Perspective of Film History

So much about Finally Dawn (Finalmente L’alba) feels perplexing. It gives the perspective of a regular Italian adolescent through a world of questionable showbiz glamor, but we rarely get insight into her interiority. It’s set against the backdrop of Hollywood productions that set up shop in Rome in the 50s, but it’s shot in such a graceful, modern way that it undermines the classic vibe of the characters – namely, British starlet Lily James playing a commanding Hollywood star of the Bette Davis kind. It clearly wants to give scathing commentary on the behind-closed-doors power abuses of Italian society, but its impact is numbed by the inert pacing and story.

Finally Dawn probably works best as a pithy blurb summing up all that’s noteworthy about it, handily omitting that everything interesting about the finished product is stranded in an intolerably long and dull film.

A lot of Hollywood seems to be understood solely from the history of subsidies. To a producer, there’s nothing more appealing than local, international, and government tax breaks and bonuses. In the wake of the Allied Victory in World War II, Italy’s film production lot Cinecittà (initially founded by Mussolini’s Fascist government) sat empty and waiting for American money to help revitalize their industry. Thus, “Hollywood on the Tiber” was born, with classics such as Quo Vadis?, Roman Holiday, Ben-Hur, and Jason and the Argonauts taking advantage of the stunning vistas and cheap labor.