A splendid one-off debut from Paola Cortellesi which confounds expectation in the final scenes, making you realise that the film you thought you were watching was not the one she had been making. There will inevitably be comparisons made with Alfonso Cueron’s awards ladened Roma. Each is filmed in black and white and examines the turbulence of life in a city at a time of momentous change. Each focuses on the travails of a single family where neorealism and comedy rub shoulders. But the languorous indulgences of Roma were missing here, replaced by a carefully paced and well constructed narrative, throwing light on important themes. I really liked it. Downtrodden housewife Delia (Cortellesi) is the central hub. She lives with her husband Ivano, their three children and a curmudgeonly bed ridden father-in-law, all of whom make her life difficult, each in their own particular ways. Her two boys constantly bicker. Ivano is feckless and cruel. And Marcella, her teenage daughter, is ashamed of Delia’s apparent weakness and ignorance. But mum gets on with things, displaying real stoic grace and Cortellesi gives a compelling and completely convincing performance. It’s 1946 and times are hard in a defeated capital city. GIs in Jeeps cruise through streets where the native population is barely scraping by. The realisation of this world by DoP Davide Leone and his production design team is seriously impressive. There is palpable nostalgia in the air and at times it feels like you’re watching De Sica filming a documentary. Ivano could be a cartoon villain, but is shown as very much the product of his times. The justification of his misogyny is partly that it was always thus, but as he repeatedly reminds us, he has had the misfortune to suffer the effects of serving in both world wars. His understandable bitterness surfaces in abusive behaviour and the persistent gaslighting of his wife, which Cortellesi films in an extremely provocative way. She uses apache dancing accompanied by a lighthearted score to depict Delia’s nightmare. It’s a jarring decision which sits uncomfortably with the hyper-realistic style of the rest of the film and I wonder if a male director would even have dared consider it. But it was a clever way of illustrating the problem without over demonising the culprit and was both generous and surprising in its conception. As the film progresses it offers Delia a couple of promising escape options. First she is befriended by a black GI who tries to help and then she reconnects with an old boyfriend whose work as a motor mechanic is about to take him away to the north. All the while she is running errands, mending garments, delivering medical shots; anything to earn a lire or two which she can use to supplement the family income. But secretly she has plans of her own and she salts away a portion of her meagre income for reasons we’re never really sure about. But when Marcella announces her engagement to the son of a relatively prosperous local cafe owner, mum detects signs that her own experience is set to be repeated and she is determined that such a fate should not befall her daughter. The conclusion mixes romance, suspense and social commentary in a delicate balance that would have been a challenge to a much more experienced director. But Cortellesi pulls it off with real aplomb. I even heard gasps from the audience as the fate of Delia teeters on a knife edge over the final scenes. And there were a few tears as the contents of her final message to Marcella is revealed. There’s still time to catch Tomorrow. Make sure you don’t miss it.
Rating. 19/20
Viewed. 7/6/2024
Screen 2 (E7)
Phoenix Films 2024 