After big Mafia kingpin Don Antonino (Amerigo Tot) and the whole
management level of his clan are (temporarily) arrested, small-fry
gangster Vito (Alessio Orano) suddenly finds himself swept to the top of
Don Antonino's clan, at least until the Don is out again. Thing is, Vito
isn't cut out to be a leader, he is proud to the point of arrogance, a
typical bully thanks to his high status in the mafia, and je refuses to
listen to anybody's advice, anybody's advice but Don Antonino that is, who
tells him to marry a poor woman, because they are less trouble.
So Vito picks up young Francesca (Ornella Muti), the 15-year old
daughter of a piss-poor farmer family who has lost almost everything in
the earthquake. At first, Francesca is impressed by handsome and rich
Vito, who presents himself as a man of the world ... even if he uses brute
force to chase Francesca's current fiancé away. Soon though, Francesca
realizes that Vito isn't really in love with her but just has the idea of
owning her and controlling her. After a big row, she breaks up with him,
on the day before her wedding ... which is something he thinks
unthinkable, so the next day he waits for her at the wedding registry ...
only to ultimately lose face when she fails to appear.
At first, Vito tries to just forget Francesca, but when he is mocked by
a rival clan about being stood up by her, he changes his tactics, has her
kidnapped in broad daylight and brought to a nearby motel where he rapes
her. Then he invites everybody to celebrate their engagement, even her
parents, who don't even bother to hide their disappointment in their
daughter, and only when she tells them she was forced to everything, they
forgive her. However, when she goes to the police the next day to report
the kidnapping and rape to make Vito pay, nobody, not even her parents,
stands up for her, on the contrary, she, the victim of a rape, is accused
to be an informer ... still, Francesca insists on going through with it,
even though Vito's gang kills the family goat and her father (Tano
Cimarosa) throws her out, fearing to lose everything, even though he has
no more than an old shack full of corn and wine. Eventually, Francesca
even burns the shack down to make her father, who has now nothing more to
defend, stand up for her, but to no avail.
Only Vito's rivals in the family business turn sympathetic
towards her because they want to use her as bait to get rid of Vito, but
before she goes through with it, she realizes that way she wouldn't be any
better than Vito herself, and she gives the assassination plan away to
Vito.
On the day of the trial, Francesca tries for the last time to reason
with Vito, but for him his hurt pride is way more important than anything
else ... so she testifies against him - and immediately thereafter is
almost lynched by the women of her neighbourhood for being an informer,
only to be saved by a priest ... who, totally lost in the church's double
standards, tries to persuade her to marry Vito - her rapist - because
she's no longer a virgin.
The tide only turns when the neighbourhood women almost stone a girl to
death who spoke out for Francesca - which makes her dad realize that the
girl could have been Francesca, and that everybody wronged her all along
the way ... and when she testifies on her behalf in court, it's only a
question of time until others follow - and ultimately, Vito gets 10 years
...
A great, compelling and at the same time totally unpretentious film
about the Sicilian Mafia by director Damiano Damiani, who throughout his
career made the Mafia the main topic of his movies ... but this, an early
example of his brand of Mafia cinema, might very well be his very best.
Basically the film, vaguely based on a true story, is a portrait of the
life of Sicilian lower classes reminiscent of Italian Neo Realismo
and the influence the Mafia has on this life, without being
sensationalistic or preachy, and by and large without depicting sex or
violence - the two driving forces of the story -, and wouldn't you know
it, the film works like a charm. Of course, it doesn't hurt either that
newcomer Ornella Muti, only 14 years of age when this was filmed, gives a
great performance, maybe the best of her career.
Highest recommendation.
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