Il grido (English: "The Cry", initially released as The Outcry in the US[2]) is a 1957 road drama film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni and starring Steve Cochran, Alida Valli, Dorian Gray, Gabriella Pallotta and Betsy Blair.

When Irma learns that her estranged husband, who left for Australia years earlier, has died, Aldo sees an opportunity to marry her and legitimize their daughter.

After parting ways with Virginia, Aldo finds employment with a dredge crew and contemplates moving to Venezuela, even beginning to learn Spanish.

Heavy rains and scarce resources strain their situation, leading Andreina to seek food by offering herself to a restaurant owner.

[10][11] In her 1984 analysis of Italian cinema, Mira Liehm writes that while Il grido contains neo-realist elements, "particularly the interdependence between the landscapes and the characters and the emphasis on objects", protagonist Aldo "foreshadows Sandro in L'avventura and Giovanni in La notte in his refusal to acknowledge the fading of love".

While French critic Gérard Gozlan (Positif) saw it as a suicide,[13] Seymour Chatman argues that Aldo is overcome with vertigo as he stands atop the tower, causing him to fall to his death.

[15] Liehm, Brunette and Geoffrey Nowell-Smith also point out that as an exception in Antonioni's films, the protagonist of Il grido is a member of the working class instead of the bourgeoisie,[12][15][16] an observation confirmed by the director in an interview in which he stated that only Il grido and his early documentary short Gente del Po (1947) were about working class concerns.

[18] The film was realised as an Italian–American co-production and shot in Winter 1956/1957 on location in the lower Po Valley, including Occhiobello, Pontelogoscuro, Ferrara, Stienta and Ca'Venier.

[18] Antonioni later spoke of problems he had with some of the American actors: with Betsy Blair, because she wanted the meaning behind her complete dialogue explained in detail, and with Steve Cochran for regularly refusing to follow the director's instructions.

[14] Of the films Antonioni had made up to this point, Il grido proved to be the least successful at the box office, earning a mere 25 million lire during its initial release.

[20] While Antonioni's previous film Le Amiche had been artistically acknowledged by Italian critics, the reactions towards Il grido were, depending on the source, unanimously negative[18] or sympathetic only in a handful of cases,[16] calling its director "cold" and "inhuman".

[22] F. Maurice Speed, writing for the British Film Review, was more enthusiastic, calling it "brilliant" and "sad, fascinating and finely directed".