le notti bianche is a very touching film and i totally agree about mastroianni´s performance...maria schell´s acting in general is often dangeriously close to kitsch,but i think that she conveyed the character very well.it is this idea of idealistic and absolute love,an excess of feelings almost and also a great naivety that borders on cruelty that she portrayed very intensly.the character is almost painfully ignorant of the world.it would have been interesting to see how monica would have played such a part.she is a very versatile acress but her film characters often seemed to have a sphinxlike quality as if they were in the know of all the secrets of the world,which is quite in contrast to the notti bianche character...