PAOLA CORTELLESI, ROMANA MAGGIORA VERGANO, VALERIO MASTANDREA, GIANMARCO FILIPPINI, MATTIA BALDO;
SEATED, GIORGIO COANGELI IN THERE'S STILL TOMORROW

PAOLA CORTELLESI: THERE'S STILL TOMORROW/C'È ANCORA DOMANI (2023) NIC

Neorealist style attack on patriarchy hits us over the head, yet is spot-on

There is no subtlety to this film shot in black and white and set in an impoverished 1946 Rome, and none intended. When the brutal dolt of a husband Ivano (Valerio Mastandrea ) wakes up in bed, the first thing he does is slap his wife, Delia (Paola Cortellesi) hard across the face. She is not only a mere servant for her husband, her life a string of wearying day-to-day jobs and devices to scrape together a little money, but he continually mocks and abuses her. She is just chattel to him. Despite a lingering romance with Nino (Vinicio Marchioni), a mechanic in the neighborhood who could have been a decent partner and still wants her to run off with him as he migrates to the North, Delia feels utterly trapped. Much of the film is a detailed picture of impoverished postwar Roman life and woman's place at the bottom of it.

More tellingly, conversation between the eldest daughter Marcella (Romana Maggiora Vergano) and her fiancé Giulio (Francesco Centorame) reveals that she will be chattel for him, too. He tells her henceforth she will wear makeup only for him and not for work, and after marriage, she'll no longer work. "You're mine," he says, and her mother hears, and sees him grab her by the neck the same way Ivano grabs her. Mutual violence is softened a little for us by being presented halfway as a dance. Everyone fights, and the younger kids use coarse, abusive language they've learned from their male elders, who include faux-invalid, menacing grandfather Ottorino (Giorgio Colangeli).

The mother, the main character in this film, is played by Paola Cortellesi, the writer-director, who is also a famous and popular comedienne and singer renowned throughout Italy who has long had such themes on her mind, says a [i]New York Times article[/I] that recounts the enormous influence and popularity of this film in the home country, where it outdid Barbie, and beyond. It has reportedly done quite well in France: though the critical response is only an AlloCiné 3.2 (64%), the French spectators score is a whopping 4.3 (86%). It's one of Italy's ten all-time highest grossing films, but not only that: it's become a tool of instruction and debate nation-wide. It touches a nerve. Patriarchy is alive and well in Italy but the public is now ready to look hard at that.

It's useless therefore to say this movie is extremely harsh and crude, and beside the point: its account of poor women's postwar daily lives is detailed, and beside that, it's also frequently funny. More debatable, however, is its plotline's manipulative side. Delia (Cortellesi's character) forms a bond with Black American Occupation forces MP William (Yonv Joseph) by restoring to him the only family photo he has, which is like gold for him, and he offers to help her any way she wants. This sets him up as a deus ex machina, permitting Delia to save Marcella from Giulio and thus from the cycle of abuse she has been locked into for so long. (There are younger kids coming up.)

This film is more editorializing than art, but quality nonetheless went into its making. The presence of the excellent Valerio Mastandrea as evil husband Ivano points to a cast that's fine all down the line. Exterior street scenes likewise show a meticulous historical accuracy that permeates the film, and the many minor characters populating those scenes with their pervasive Roman dialect are hilarious and spot-oh. A score consisting of blatantly contemporary songs helps underline the tongue-in-cheek anachronism of the whole concept of the film. There's something positively Brechtian. You can't look away for a second, or be lulled into identification or get lost in the fiction. Every minute is a message steeped in specificity, the final one being the day when women first got the vote in Italy and turned out en masse to choose republican government. This is a new type of film, not one we may have the appetite for much more of, but one extremely effective for now. It will be interesting to see if There's Still Tomorrow makes any waves on these shores as it has in France.

C'è ancora domani/There's Still Tomorrow, 118 mins., debuted at Rome Film Festival Oct. 18, 2023, in Italian cinemas from Oct. 26 and was showered with awards. French theatrical release Mar. 13, 2024 (AlloCiné scores 3.2 press, 4.3 spectators). Screened for this review as part of the Open Roads: New Italian Cinema series at Lincoln Center (May 30-Jun. 6, 2024). Showtimes at the Walter Reade Theater:
Thursday, May 30 at 4:00pm
Monday, June 3 at 6:00pm
Thursday, June 6 at 8:45pm

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©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.