"What’s that one… the one with Marlon Brando and Anna Magnani, from the Tennessee Williams script. It had several titles. It was called Orpheus Descending, the [original] script…"

"It’s Anna Magnani, with this little kid, and she’s a prostitute. I love Pasolini’s films; they’re very political and really kind of deal with everyday people, and there’s something quite beautiful about that one."

"Anna Magnani is at the center of the two 30-minutes films that comprise L'Amore. In the first, Fellini acts by her side. The second one is an adaptation of a play by Cocteau. Magnani is a woman from the countryside in the first, a woman from the city in the second. A genius actress.Anna Magnani is at the center of the two 30-minutes films that comprise L'Amore. In the first, Fellini acts by her side. The second one is an adaptation of a play by Cocteau. Magnani is a woman from the countryside in the first, a woman from the city in the second. A genius actress."

"When I saw this at 17 Pasolini’s photography of Rome blasted open my ideas of Italy. I think Anna Magnani is the true face of Prada: hips, heels, laughing, crying, shouting, tragic, and terrifically beautiful."

"How can you go wrong with a Tennessee Williams script (originally his play Orpheus Descending) directed by Sidney Lumet, with the great Anna Magnani, Joanne Woodward, and Marlon Brando (playing a retired guitar player named Snakeskin, who is trying to turn over a new leaf in a very racist southern town). An obscure classic."

"Pier Paolo Pasolini’s affection and compassion for Rome’s cafoni, or peasant, class shines through in what is perhaps the most accessible of all his films. Anna Magnani plays an ex-hooker trying to escape her past while raising her troubled teenage son. Pasolini sets Magnani loose as the indomitable salt-of-the-earth mother. Her range of emotion and expression is unbridled, exuberant, and overflowing—a force of nature. Pay attention to the wedding scene and you’ll see Pasolini’s love of Renaissance art on display as he re-creates Da Vinci’s Last Supper, casting the denizens of Rome’s slums as the apostles."