Perhaps I just don’t understand mid-century Italian cinema, but this is a god-awful movie. After Casablanca, it’s hard to imagine Ingrid Bergman in a movie as bad as this one. She plays a woman in post-WWII Europe who marries a former Italian soldier in order to get out of a displaced persons camp. He takes her to his home on the volcanic island of Stromboli and, literally, the minute she steps off the boat she starts complaining about how someone of her class simply cannot live in a place like Stromboli. And then it goes downhill from there (no pun intended). At one point, the movie felt like a documentary about the Italian fishing industry and at another point, her husband nails a piece of wood across the front door of their house to thwart her stated purpose to leave the island. She escapes, tries to cross the island over the volcano, spends what I assume is supposed to be “a dark night of the soul” on the volcano and wakes up the next morning, looks down at the village and calls out to God - then the movie ends. Unfortunately, calling out to God couldn’t help this movie. The only thing that could have made this movie any worse would have been a mime at the end releasing a balloon into the sky.

Of course, Ingrid Bergman is always nice to look at but this movie is so bad, the only reason to waste your time on it is because of the consequences it ended up having on her personal life and subsequent movie career. Otherwise, on its own merits, this movie is dreck.

For years I missed seeing this because critics in the 1950's didn't like it. Watching it now, I find it's a good movie, very real and raw. Ingrid Bergman gives a great performance as a sexy bad girl trying to find a place in a difficult post war Italy. The scene where she hits on the priest is out of this world.

I only watched this to see Ingrid Bergman, but even she couldn't make it worth the grueling torture and boredom of this very dull, occasionally disturbing film. You can tell at points that the director was trying to say something, but it all fell flat.
The version I watched on Prime Video was also not well preserved or crisp, as it may be on DVD. I noticed no startling, dramatic scenery (as another reviewer described the setting.) it was sparse and isolated and very dull.
I truly *LOVE* great old films, but this is NOT one of them! "They say" Ingrid Bergman was box office poison after this movie, "because" of the love affair and resulting child with the already "married" director, but I think the love affair was simply "used" to cover up the fact that the MOVIE was POISON! Ingrid Bergman was not good in this, but that was primarily the fault of the writing, directing, and editing, not her! Worst movie I have ever seen.. that I expected to find merit in!

Stromboli good

It’s great movies!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Could be my fault but I didn't notice that this movie was not in english. It was Italian with english subtitles. I would think that that would be prominently posted. Great movie though.

I am a fan of "old" movies and a fan of Ingrid Bergman but this is one of the worst films I have ever seen.

This is, since I saw it last night, one of my favorite 10 films ever. It has such an emotional, passionate spiritual charge that seems to be about to erupt any time inside you. The story gets you from the start; you will grow to understand all the characters here. If you énd up hating the townfolk (the pharisees of the story) you will surely have missed the whole point, for this is a story of love and sacrifice, exactly what The Lord Jesus was all about. For, also, Ingrid Bergman grows to accept God's will by aknowledging that she can't fight "the world" by herself, thus her heartwrenching cry out to 'Dio' at the end of the film. Ms. Bergman is in the best of her career here, the role just suits her person perfectly. Pay attention to her facial expressions while contemplating how the fishermen catch the tune, how really vulnerable she looks. How well mr. Rossellini has captured her evolution from carnal superiority and selfishness to spiritual realization of herself. Her climb up the volcano extenuates the last of her physical strenght making her rely only of whatever seems to hang on those beautiful stars in the night sky. She gives herself up to God, that God she resisted to believe or rely on. But the existence of that God will afect you only if you make the great leap of faith first. And she seems to make it. A glorious moment in the history of film. A work of art. Her clim up the volcano is one of the most emotionally charged moments in the history of film.

I hope someday Criterion gives the right treatment to this gorgeous movie (even only for the wonderful Sicilian settings is worth watching -it reminds me of Antonioni's La'ventura-). I wathced a cheap Region 2 edition which is a sacrilege to the quality of this film.