Unmasking Italy’s Past: Filming Modern Italy through la commedia all’italiana

Abstract

This thesis explores the intersections between modern Italian history, politics, and the Italian comic tradition. By examining the comic film genre, la commedia all’italiana (‘Comedy, Italian Style’), which endured from the late 1950s to the late 1970s in Italy, this thesis argues that these films offer a complex, idiosyncratic and non-linear perspective of Fascist, wartime and postwar Italy. These socio-political commentaries allow us to mediate and draw connections between significant intervals of Italy’s contested pasts, thus providing a multidirectional vision of modern Italian history. This thesis will identify the stock characters, parodies and caricatures in these comedies, which have evolved from the masked ‘types’ of the form of theatre, la commedia dell’arte of the sixteenth and seventeenth century. These politically-charged comedies were simultaneously canonised and reviled by critics in the US, Europe, and Italy—and today, largely forgotten. Although the controversy surrounding these films was fleeting, this thesis will demonstrate that their impact endures. By depicting recognisable cultural stereotypes, behavioural traits, and scenarios drawn from quotidian Italian life, these filmmakers were able to expose certain aspects of Italian society in a palatable manner for broader Italian audiences. The films of la commedia all’italiana compelled Italians to confront the legacy of Fascism and World War Two; the devastation and ideological disillusionment of the immediate postwar era; the broader social repercussions of the rapid industrial and economic growth of the 1960s; and finally, Italy’s violent and politically turbulent ‘Years of Lead’ (Gli Anni di Piombo), which endured from the late 1960s until the early 1980s. Tracing the evolution of these archetypes in accordance with their ever-shifting social milieux illuminates certain defining moments of Italian history. In addition, it also highlights how representations of these figures have contributed to popular understandings of Italy’s past and its peoples. This thesis will establish the films of la commedia all’italiana as invaluable sources of historical inquiry, which enrich, and add depth to, traditional forms of scholarship. These political comedies thus allow us to engage and draw connections between multiple junctures of history, as well as granting us a more direct interaction with the present.