La moglie più bella

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.

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.

Most other comments are right on the spot.

Excellent movie, good acting and marvellous music.

There are a few things i'd like to add. Sometimes, this film slows down a bit, but never long enough to It's not a genre movie at all, but if you would want to tag it, I'd give it a thriller label.

The main trouble with films like this is that it so hard to 'like' them. Not that this one is pure depressing, but you'll get to see a desperate world on the bottom of the mafia and the place where it has its roots. And it isn't like the godfather.

My final verdict is an 8 out of 10. There is nothing wrong with this movie, but it hasn't the 100% perfection for a higher score. Still, very gripping and plain good.

Starting from the surprisingly excellent "I am not scared" (strongly recommended), I started to become interested in Damiano Damani's movies and I was stunned to discover what a great and socially committed director he was! This movie surely ranks among his best. It deals with the condition of women in the regions of mafia, where mentality is so narrow and ignorant to become almost hilarious when not dramatic. The character played by the beautiful and very young Ornella Muti is a real marvel. In her village she is one of its kind: she is intelligent, sensible, has a strong temper, sense of justice and anti-conformist views. In other words she cannot easily merge in the social context she is growing in. The plot develops slowly and little by little one is sucked into the story thanks to a group of very good actors, a nice score by Morricone and mainly Damiani's masterful screenplay. The end is very touching, as the tears in the sensitive young girl represent the tragic but necessary result of a chain of events that it was impossible to stop. This movie, together with "L'istruttoria e' chiusa: dimentichi"; "Pizza Connection"; "Confessions of a Police Captain" and "Un uomo in ginocchio" should constantly pass through the Italian national TV schedules, as the lesson(s) is still far from being learnt.

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.