Le Amiche (1955, It.) (aka The Girlfriends)

In Michelangelo Antonioni's existential, ensemble melodrama based upon Cesare Pavese's 1949 novella Among Women Only (aka Tra donne sole) - the director's fourth feature film (and his first great film), about women's issues and crises involving careers, fashion, love and emotional relationships and alliances among mostly idle-rich, bourgeoise females:

• the main characters: five fairly prosperous, shallow, snobby, aimless, cruel and petulant women in Turin, Italy, seen through the eyes of a returning, strong-willed career female to her native hometown - Clelia (Eleonora Rossi Drago) - she had become a successful working woman after setting up and managing a fashion-clothing boutique salon in Rome, and was now in town to open another branch store - she checked into her hotel room and was drawing a bath for herself
• the precipitating incident - the near-death suicide of troubled, sensitive and jilted Rosetta Savoni (Madeleine Fischer) in Clelia's hotel (in the next adjoining room) - she had taken an overdose of pills and was found unconscious lying on a bed (wearing an elegant gown) [Note: later, it was revealed that she was depressed over unrequited love from an unavailable male (Lorenzo), an artist who had painted her portrait.]
• the other characters, all socialite friends of Rosetta, included:
  - Momina De Stefani (Yvonne Furneaux), worldly, flirtatious and cynical, estranged from her wealthy husband, and randomly and frivolously involved with many men, including Cesare (Franco Fabrizi), the stylish architect of Clelia's new salon
  - Nene (Valentina Cortese), a ceramics artist living with her recent husband - the frustrated, depressed, self-obsessed and unsuccessful second-rate painter Lorenzo (Gabriele Ferzetti)
  - Mariella (Anna Maria Pancani), a flighty, self-centered 'good-time' girl hedonist
• the sequences involving Clelia's relationship with impoverished, lower-class Carlo (Ettore Manni), the assistant of the salon's architect, and realizing they were separated by class and taste differences
• the brilliant sequence that featured masterful camerawork (medium view tracking shots) during a Sunday beach outing by the group of women (and some males) on a gray, cold and windy overcast day
• in the denouement, Rosetta's more successful suicide death after being rejected by Lorenzo - revealed in an overhead shot of the city docks after Rosetta's body had been recovered, placed on a stretcher, and was about to be taken away in an ambulance
• shortly later, the scene of Clelia angrily - in front of all the salon's clientele - accusing Momina of having irresponsibly encouraged and set up a liaison between Lorenzo and Rosetta - and ultimately becoming her murderer; assuming wrongly that she had been fired for her hysterical outburst, Clelia decided to return to Rome

Clelia's Train Departure From Turin

• the last sequence - Clelia left on the train (without meeting up with Carlo for a scheduled date at the train station's bar prior to departure) - Carlo watched her train depart from the platform without her noticing him