| N.U. | |
| Director: | Michelangelo Antonioni |
| Producer: | Vieri Bigazzi (production manager) |
| Music: | Giovanni Fusco |
| Cinematography: | Giovanni Ventimiglia |
| Studio: | I.C.E.T., Milan |
| Distributor: | Lux Film |
| Runtime: | 11 minutes |
| Country: | Italy |
| Language: | Italian |
N.U. (short for Nettezza urbana, Italian urban cleansing service)[1] [2] is a 1948 Italian documentary short film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. The film examines a weekday from morning until evening of Italian road sweepers, captured at work on the streets of post-World War II Rome.
In a 1961 discussion with film students, Antonioni explained that he wanted to achieve a contrast to the then dominating neorealist documentary style with his film by use of a "poetically free montage".[3]
N.U. has been screened as part of retrospectives on Antonioni at various festivals and institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art,[5] the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive,[6] and the Cinémathèque Française.[7] It has been released on home media as part of The Criterion Collection's release of Antonioni's Red Desert.[8]