This movie is great for those who:
-love Italian culture
-love Italian kids
-love southern Italian dialect
This movie haunted me at movie stores since I became interested in foreign films 4 or 5 years ago. Glaring and obnoxious as its cover is, I finally rented it. All in all a decent comedy.
In my ratings scale, comedies are graded more on their humor than their story line. In the case of this movie, that is a good thing. A weak story of coincidence, a northern italian professor ends up teaching in the chaos that is Italy southern (Napoli).
I loved the movie because I understand italian well enough to not read the satisfactory subtitles and because the kids were luminous compared to the usual fumbling kiddie actors; these ones were adorable and their lines hilarious.
Other notes: There is a lot of vulgarity in this movie, as is typical in the south. The lead, a likeable Paolo Villaggio, plays foil for the wild kids. The story is simple and dismissable. The cinematography is standard, blessed by the wondrous ambient that is the dilapidated South. A normally celebrated Wertmuller seems to have chosen an easy project here. The movie was produced by media mogul Silvio Berlusconi (vaffa!).
Ultimately it's a movie to waste 90 min, but it was enjoyable and will certainly rouse a smile when I see it on the shelves next time.
6/10, JCC
