Long Overdue

The 1942 Italian film of Ayn Rand's debut novel We The Living is a gem. The novel is itself well worthwhile, even if (or especially if) you think already know all you need to know about Rand and her fiction. It's definitely underrated, very good, and interestingly different from her later fiction. Also, it's a valuable primary source on life in Bolshevik Russia. Anyway, in case you hadn't heard the story of the movie, it's pretty neat: in the early 40s, some liberty-minded Italian filmmakers decided to make the movie. Being at war with the US, they couldn't get permission from Rand, so they just did it. The fascist censors, seeing it was critical of their Russian enemies, let things go ahead, not realizing it was anti-fascist also. When they figured it out, most copies of the film were destroyed, but not all, and decades later Rand tracked it down and oversaw the initial stages of preparing it for rerelease. I first saw it in the late 80s, after seeing an article about it in the January 89 Reason, having never read any Rand. I found it extremely moving and intellectually stimulating. A few years later, I thought I should buy a copy on VHS, but DVDs were starting to become commonplace, so I held off, figuring I'd wait til it was released on DVD. And I've been waiting for 15 years. But now it's available! About time too. (HT Roderick Long, on his other blog.)