The Unknown Woman starts out as a puzzle. Irene a Ukrainian immigrant arrives in an Italian city and starts stalking a wealthy local family. In flashback sequences we see her rough past as a prostitute and sex slave. She eventually enters the lives of the family she is spying on by becoming their maid and caregiver to their young daughter Thea. As the movie progresses she gets closer to Thea and her connection to the family becomes clear as her past starts to catch up with her. When the pieces come together the mystery turns into a character drama and Irene must fight to keep her new life from falling apart.
Shot in dark tones with grey skies and dark clothes mimicking the cold harshness of Irene’s life The Unknown Woman sustains a mood of dark foreboding. Irene is also constructed as a psychologically complex character her tenderness for Thea offset by her cruelty in getting people out of her way.
Despite these Bicycle Thief touches the film is essentially a fantasy. Both the suspenseful opening sequences and the softer drama towards the end are cloaked in clichés and romantic ideals that are sometimes incongruous with the casual brutality of the movie. For instance after a series of scenes in which Irene teaches Thea to defend herself the little girl beats up a schoolyard bully while the maid looks on lovingly.
The Unknown Woman ultimately isn’t the sum of its parts. The direction is seamless the storytelling is smooth and the cinematography is gorgeous — even the soundtrack (courtesy of spaghetti western veteran Ennio Morricone) is excellent. However the earnestness of the film’s neorealist subject matter clashes with the romance in the script. At the end we’re left feeling that the denouement is too simplistic for a movie with such a complex central character.
Despite this major flaw The Unknown Woman is worth seeing. The film’s atmosphere is fantastic the suspense is tangible and the time it takes to put the pieces of the mystery together sustains the tension until near the end of the movie.
