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A breached stone wall frames soldiers and Rome's skyline beneath the title.

Image: Monocurator · source · Original Monocurator artwork

Historical drama

La presa di Roma

TenseBeautiful Approachable · Moderate Historical drama

The capture of Rome is condensed into staged military action and a patriotic reconstruction of 20 September 1870.

Year
1905
Director
Filoteo Alberini
Country
Italy
Length
6 min
Language
Silent; Italian intertitles

What to expect

Often treated as a foundational Italian narrative film, it shows national history becoming screen spectacle while cinema was still measured in minutes.

How to ease in

Approach it as a surviving fragment of a larger original programme. Notice how costume, formation, and a few emblematic actions turn history into an official memory.

Heads-up

A quick, non-exhaustive note Includes battle violence, death, nationalism, and an incomplete surviving form.
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Six minutes can still make a political claim about who owns history. I am interested in how quickly reconstruction begins to look like memory.

— Momo

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Credits & versions

Version map

CSC–Cineteca Nazionale 2007 restoration6 min · restorationThe archive record lists 00:06:00 at 18 fps. Four surviving tableaux are supplemented with explanatory titles for three missing scenes. Black-and-white footage includes conjectural colour reconstruction in the titles and final tableau; this is not a complete surviving 1905 print.Source: CSC–Cineteca Nazionale / Portale Cinema Muto Italiano — La presa di RomaRuntime reference · Checked 2026-09-24
Wikidata 6-minute listing6 min6 minutes reproduces the single duration stated by the source. The listing does not identify a cut, score, territory, frame rate, source element, or restoration.Source: Wikidata — La presa di RomaChecked 2026-08-22

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