Pasolini's hand-held camera

Question

In most of his films, Pier Paolo Pasolini uses a shaky hand-held camera almost constantly, though it is not needed on most occasions. Can anybody clarify why he preferred to use this technique?

Answer 1

According to the BFI:

Like Bernardo Bertolucci, Pasolini began under the influence of classic Italian neorealism. Pasolini’s first film, Accattone (1961) – often cited as the last neorealist film – returns to the petty criminal underworld of the Roman ‘borgate’ (suburbs) that he explored in his previous novels. However, despite sharing certain superficial similarities with classical neorealism (such as non-professional actors, on-location shooting and handheld camerawork), Pasolini found a squalid lyricism that celebrated the radical opposition of the criminal sub-proletariat to the growing culture of mass media and material living.