Boccaccio ’70 (1962) [NR] ****

In his famously bawdy collection of 100 tales, The Decameron, humanist author Giovanni Boccaccio cast a critical eye on 14th century Italian culture, mocking religious hypocrisy in the wake of the Black Plague, detailing the differences between newly defined social classes, and attempting to change the country's Church-stultified attitudes towards sex by portraying love as complicated and the source of much folly, but entirely natural—that is, not shameful or sin-ridden.

In 1962, some six-hundred years later, four of Italy's greatest filmmakers -Mario Monicelli, Federico Fellini, Luchino Visconti, and Vittorio de Sica - would borrow the frame-story device of The Decameron and take a similarly askew glance at the pretensions and sexual standards of their own time in Boccaccio '70, a four-part anthology film that's sexy and strange, elegant and comic, sometimes all at once. Made after Italy's post-war prosperity began to kick in, but before the cultural revolution of the mid-to-late 1960s, the film documents a society in transition, with widening generational / gender gaps and morality - especially sexual morality - in a state of flux. The film itself seems caught between two times; neither prudish nor especially explicit, it might best be described as coy, batting its eyelashes and beckoning to the audience with a come-hither gaze. It's damn near irresistible. No one did sexy, nonchalant cool like the Italian directors of the 1960s.

In Act I, Renzo e Luciana, director Mario Monicelli introduces us to Renzo, an errand boy (Germano Gilioli), and Luciana, a bookkeeper (the gorgeous Marisa Solinas) who are deeply, secretly in love. Luciana's been feeling nauseated, and suspects she may be pregnant, so the two get wedded in a makeshift, spur-of-the-moment ceremony that's met with disapproval by her stern parents. Since they don't make enough on their meager salaries to buy a place of their own, Renzo and Luciana have to move into her family's cramped apartment, which leaves them no privacy on their wedding night - or any other night, for that matter. The sexual tension is palpable. All they want to do is do it, but the walls are thin, dad is playing poker in the next room with his buddies, and someone is blaring a boxing match on television. The mood isn’t exactly right. Making matters worse, they have to keep their nuptials a secret from their manager, a lecher who enforces the company policy forbidding female employees from getting married, partially because there was no maternity leave in those days. At its core, the film is about pressure - the pressure to have (or not have) premarital sex, the pressure to get married if you are pregnant, and the financial pressure of being young and immaturely married - and the sexually stymied couple is portrayed beautifully by Gilioli and Solinas as sexually frustrated and not in control of their own lives.

In Act II, Fellini's Le tentazioni del dottor Antonio (The temptation of doctor Antonio), the false virtue under fire is prudery - specifically the fiery, religious brand of indignation towards sex that's typically the result of repression and guilt. Peppino de Filippo stars as Antonio Mazzuolo, a self-righteous citizen who takes it upon himself to crusade for public decency. He's a pious tyrant, basically, the kind of guy who goes down to Lover's Lane to shine bright lights on the couples making out in their cars. What really gets his goat, though, is when an advertising agency erects a billboard in the vacant lot across from his home, with the image of a sultry, large-chested sex-bomb blond Anita Ekberg, looking like a precursor to Anna-Nicole Smith - reclining bare-legged on a couch and holding a frosty glass of milk. Antonio calls it an offense to the most sacred aspect of maternity – breastfeeding - and makes it his mission to get the sign taken down. His quixotically sanctimonious obsession leads gradually to all-out insanity, as Antonio imagines the woman coming down out of the billboard and parading around town, a curvaceous giantess intent on exposing her lewdness to the innocent and pure of mind. It's Fellini's take on Attack of the 50 Foot Woman, and it's every bit as bizarre as you'd imagine, with double entendre imagery galore - see the fire hose spraying the breasts on the billboard - and a great deal of comedy at the intersection of the supposedly sacred and so-called profane.

Act III, Luchino Visconti's contribution, Il lavoro (The Job), is the film's strongest, and at the same time weakest entry. Strongest because it's a rather serious, dialogue-heavy parlor drama that best stands alone if viewed separately, and weakest because it doesn't fit as well with the others, which are essentially sex farces. Like several of Visconti's films, it's about the unsatisfied lives of the rich and fabulously bored. In this case, it follows the crumbling relationship of an aristocratic couple who married to join her father’s money with his title. The husband, Ottavio (Tomas Milian), a count, has just become embroiled in a Silvio Berlusconi-esque sex scandal - he was caught frolicking with high-class prostitutes - and he's being lambasted daily in the press. This has obviously upset his wife Pupe, played by the supremely elegant Romy Schneider, who has retreated to her bedroom, comforted by a litter of kittens. As the story unfolds, we discover that Pupe has interviewed the madam and several of the prostitutes Ottavio is accused of having sex with. We also find out that she is considering separating from him, and has made a large wager with her father, who is sure she will not be able to find a job and support herself. She spends much of the story trying to decide if she will go out or stay in, getting dressed, getting undressed, taking a bath, asking Ottavio to help her dry off, getting dressed again, in a series of fancy outfits. On one level her actions reflect her boredom and indecision, but on another level they are designed to tease her wayward husband. Schneider's performance aches with sad beauty, and as always, Visconti is a master of control and perception, finding the cracks in the gilded veneer of a moneyed life. By the end of the story Pupe has awakened in Ottavio a burning desire to take her, and what she does with this is the most poignant and strangely satisfying, moment in the entire film.

Act IV, Vittorio de Sica's sweet and funny La riffa (The Raffle) - is perhaps most faithful to the bawdy tone of The Decameron. Appropriately, it stars that bombshell embodiment of female sex, Sophia Loren, who looks positively fertile here, hips sashaying to a kettledrum beat and breasts spilling out of her cinched and fitted top. She plays Zoe, the unobtainable object of desire at a small-town carnival, where she runs a shooting gallery, scrapping together just enough money each month to get by. When her family gets slammed with ten year's worth of back taxes they can't afford to pay, they hatch a sexual scheme, selling raffle tickets for the ultimate prize - one night alone with Zoe. The various lurkers and male chauvinists who haunt the carnival are obviously enthused, and have no troubled parting with their money for a shot at, shall we say, sowing their oats in that fallow field. But of course, nothing goes according to plan, especially not after Zoe falls for an itinerant cowboy who saves her from an on-the-loose bull. The wayward bovine is naturally attracted to her red shirt, which she quickly removes, revealing a slinky black bustier that can barely contain her, and, FYI, this isn't the last time she takes off her top. When the film debuted in New York, the always starchy New York Times critic Bosley Crowther had this to say about La riffa: The display of Miss Loren's figure is excessive to the point of tedium, and the portrayals of her various grunting suitors are more callow than comical. In the spirit of Boccaccio '70, I'll just observe that it seems like old Bosley just needed to get laid.

Labels: comedy, fantasy, romance, Romy Schneider, satire
IMDb 71/100
RottenTomatoes Averages (critics=66, viewers=78)
Blu-ray
Wikipedia Boccaccio's Decameron

Wikipedia Boccaccio '70