ROMANZO POPOLARE (Italy, 1974, 105′)

Sunday, October 6, 10 am, Cinema Centrale Arthouse

Method of access: free entry.

Director: Mario Monicelli
Screenplay: Age, Furio Scarpelli, Mario Monicelli, Ugo Tognazzi
Photography: Luigi Kuveiller, Ubaldo Terzano
Editing: Ruggero Mastroianni
Music: Enzo Jannacci
Cast: Ugo Tognazzi, Ornella Muti, Michele Placido, Pippo Starnazza, Alvaro Vitali
Production: Edmondo Amati per Capitolina Produzioni Cinematografiche (Rome), Les films galaxie (Paris)

Giulio Basletti, elderly bachelor worker from Milan, marries Vincenzina Rotunno, his own goddaughter who he helped baptise during a work trip to Avellino. As a great worker, Giulio, who is also active in labour unions, is able to provide for his family and ensure them a high-standard lifestyle. Everything is under control until Giulio brings home Giovanni, a young police officer from Southern Italy for whom Vincenzina falls in love. Adultery is inevitable. Directed by Mario Monicelli at the highest moment of his career, Romanzo popolare is a classic that deals with the theme of work. It is a movie that brings together drama and comedy with the masterful performances of Ugo Tognazzi, Ornella Muti and Michele Placido. Romanzo popolare won the 1975 David di Donatello for Best Original Screenplay. The soundtrack is signed by Enzo Jannacci with the well-known song Vincenzina e la fabbrica.
Gabriele Rigola (film historian, University of Genoa) presents the film.

Mario Monicelli  (Viareggio, Italy, 1915 – Rome, Italy, 2010), director and screenwriter. At the beginning of the 1930s he moved to Milan to study and at that time began to collaborate with the avant-garde fortnightly ‘Camminare’. After graduating in History and Philosophy, he tried to undertake a career as critic and then moved behind the camera. After starting his career as a screenwriter and assistant director, in 1949, with Al diavolo la celebrità , he started his collaboration with Steno. Together they will direct one success after another: Totò cerca casa (1949), Guardie e ladri (1951), Totò e i re di Roma (1951). Having broken this partnership with Steno in 1953, he signed many works destined to remain milestones in Italian cinematography. In 1957, he won his first Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival for the movie Padri e figli , while the following year he made I soliti ignoti , awarded with the Nastro d’argento for Best Screenplay. In 1959, he was awarded the Golden Lion in Venice for La grande guerra . Between the 1960s and 1970s, he made many of the films that will remain in the collective imagination, I compagni (1963), nominated for an Oscar, L’armata Brancaleone (1966), La ragazza con la pistola (1968). In 1975, he agreed to bring Amici mie i to the big screen. This was Pietro Germi?s work that he couldn?t make because of his illness. In 1985, with Speriamo che sia femmina – David di Donatello and Nastro d’argento for Best Director and Screenplay – he showed the crisis of the modern family. He would come back to this subject seven years later with Parenti serpenti . In 1991, he was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement. In 2006, he filmed Le rose del deserto in Tunisia, on the set of which he celebrated his 91st birthday. He died at the age of 95.

Filmography (selected):Totò e le donne (1952), Le infedeli (1953), Totò e Carolina (1955), Un eroe dei nostri tempi (1955), Padri e figli (1957), I soliti ignoti (1958), La grande guerra (1959), Risate di gioia (1960), I compagni (1963), L’armata Brancaleone (1966), La ragazza con la pistola (1968), Brancaleone alle crociate (1970), Vogliamo i colonnelli (1973), Romanzo popolare (1974), Amici miei (1975), Caro Michele (1976), Un borghese piccolo piccolo (1977), I nuovi mostri (1977), Viaggio con Anita (1978), Temporale Rosy (1979), Il marchese del Grillo (1981), Amici miei atto II (1982), Bertoldo, Bertoldino e Cacasenno (1984), La due vite di Mattia Pascal (1985), Speriamo che sia femmina (1986), I picari (1987), Parenti serpenti (1992), Cari fottutissimi amici (1994), Facciamo paradiso (1995), Panni Sporchi (1999), Le Rose del deserto (2006).