La moglie più bella

The Most Beautiful Wife is the kind of movie I usually avoid. I usually don't go for these overly depressing tales. But The Most Beautiful Wife is oddly compelling and drew me in from the start. The film is based on a true story and deals with the barbaric treatment of women (who am I kidding, these are girls) at the hands of their future husbands. Rape was an acceptable means of forcing a marriage. No other man would want the woman as she was no longer a virgin.

But as depressing as the subject matter may be, director Damiano Damiani and cinematographer Franco Di Giacomo created an incredibly lovely film with The Most Beautiful Wife. The contrast between the green, lush farm lands and the crumbling city scenes is pleasing. And Ennio Morricone's score is what I've come to expect - a work of genius. It suits the film perfectly.

Ornella Muti gives a terrific performance in the title role. And when you consider that this was her first film and that she was only 14 years old, it makes all the more amazing. As the whole film is centered around her and as she is the focal point of almost every scene, it's imperative that her performance be believable if The Most Beautiful Wife has a chance at all to work. She pulls it off flawlessly. I doubt an actress twice her age with years of experience could have done any better. It's an impressive piece of work.

Damiano Damiani is perhaps the Italian filmmaker most inspired by American cinema. He links political commitment to excellent thriller style. "La moglie piu' bella" is still shocking for me, knowing it is inspired by the true story of Franca Viola in 1965. The atmosphere is disquieting thanks to the the film-making and Ennio Morricone's music. This is also the first film of Ornella Muti, who was 14 years old at the time and pretended to be ill not to go to school for two months - the time of recording. It reminds me "La ragazza con la pistola" (The girl with the gun) by Mario Monicelli with Monica Vitti, although this one is much more ironic and aims at ridiculing certain Sicilians customs to better fight them.

Damiano Damini, the director of "La Moglie Piu Bella", two years earlier,in 1968, had made a movie about "la Mafia" titled "Il Giorno Della Civetta" starring Franco Nero, Claudia Cardinale and Lee J. Cobb. It was a stark tale, showing the helplessness of the law enforcers in front of the resignedly accepted power of the Mafia. In 1970 he had another project about the Organization, the story, loosely based in real facts, of the first Italian woman that refused the reparation by marriage of her lost honor. Instead she had the courage to denounce the violence that she suffered, at the local police station. It was very important to choose someone special for acting the leading role. Damiano Damiani chose the teenager Ornella Muti (14 years old), without previous experiences in front of the camera, to play the humbled girl, Francesca Cimarosa, who, at first, is very shy and submissive but gradually becomes a strong character person, fighting for her dignity even against her own parents that are frightened because of intimidation of the Mafia. It was said by Ornella Muti in several interviews, that she was making company to her older sister Claudia Rivelli, who was herself in search of a role in pictures when, suddenly, by pure chance, was saw by Damiani and that was all. Overnight, the teenager that was dreaming about being an actress, was in front of the camera, in an exigent leading role, making her cinematic debut under the implacable and experienced hand of Damiani. In my opinion it was a superb choice. Ornella was beautiful, shy, reserved, intense, brave and she was capable of projecting these qualities to the screen, reaching this way, the heart and the interest of the audience. An authentic natural talent, not always appreciated during the long career of the diva, always eclipsed by the sheer beauty and sexiness of her physique. Alesio Orano, future first husband of Ornella Muti in real life, plays the part of the nephew of the "local capo". At that time, he was a heartthrob, handsome, long dark hair and blue eyes. He is the dream love of the young heroine but also he possesses a streak of cruelty and he is absolutely perfect in his role. Gaetano Cimarrosa is excellent, acting as the intimidated father and Pierluigi Aprá is very efficient as the local "carabinieri", a helpless but honest police officer. It was said that this film is about feminism, but I consider it a story that has to do with the basic human dignity and choosing to live without fear in a society whose ethical values are profoundly twisted by the existence of the shady and stealth hand of the organized crime.

Alessio Orano is the main character here, too good-looking not to be likeable, but soon you learn to hate him, and the film is permeated by feelings of disgust and hatred on one hand and admiration on the other, although you can't forgive him his maltreatment of Ornella Muti, the wife he has chosen to be the most beautiful of all, but she has a mind of her own. It is based on a true story, it all happened in 1965, and the film has been made on location in the western outskirts of Palermo, mainly the village of Partinico. When she objects against his mafia methods, he tries to force her to submission by violating her, which only increases her resistance, and she finally goes to the police, thus turning the whole village and society against herself. It's a towering conflict developing with monumental relentlessness, there are not many casualties but the force of the general movement especially among the women is the more dynamic for not leading to murder but only to some lynching made the more upsetting for striking innocence. It's a great Sicilian drama, the mentality of this proud and stubborn people easily going into passions gets under your skin and becomes palpable by the barren landscapes under a relentlessly scorching sun. Ennio Morricone's very efficient music adds to the impact of this very dynamic film, with a "wedding dinner" you will not be likely to forget. Who wins in the end? Ornella Muti's tears is no answer, just a lead to a never-ending process, as the problem of the oppression of women never can be solved.

Ornella Muti has always been an interesting actress. Like a lot of her Italian contemporaries--Eleanora Giorgi, Jenny Tamburi, Gloria Guida--she has been in a lot of "exploitative" roles and movies (in one movie of hers I saw, for instance, her character willingly loses her virginity to her own father), but unlike these other actresses she has also managed to turn in a lot of superb roles in more highbrow art films, and her career has thus lasted a lot longer. On the other hand, her courage in choosing film roles has also allowed her to endure a lot longer than a lot of American actresses who never want to risk doing anything that might be exploitative and as a result never do anything really interesting either. The director Damiano Damiani is the same way--he's done art films like this, on one hand, but some the most exploitative trash imaginable (like "Amityville Horror 2"), on the other, but his films are rarely less than interesting.

This movie based on true story is about a young Sicilian girl (Muti) who is raped by the son of a Mafia don who is trying to force her to marry him by taking her virginity, but she instead goes to the police, which is something women just didn't do at the time (and something only a few brave souls in Sicily ever did to the Mafia). Muti is really good, which isn't that surprising perhaps, but so is her future husband, Alessio Oranio, who plays the mafioso, and who I had always pegged as a talentless pretty-boy. It may seem hard to believe the androgenously handsome Oranio would have to rape anyone (although it seemed to be his specialty for some reason--he also raped Jane Birkin in "May Morning", a drugged Elke Summer in "Lisa and the Devil", and Femi Benussi, kind of, in "The Killer Must Kill Again."). It's made clear in this movie, however, that the abduction and rape is a matter of pride, not sex, after this beautiful but poor peasant girl spurns the wealthy and vain young man's proposal of marriage.

I don't want to give away too much more of the plot, but it is a well-directed and well-acted and ultimately very powerful film. It's not one of Muti's more exploitative roles (she was only fourteen at the time), but she had plenty of those too. Check this one out for sure.