M.onica Vitti is no more. Cared for by her husband Roberto Russowho left Water Veltroni to communicate his death, perhaps the most beloved actress of Italian cinema she left today – February 2 – at 90 years old. Of which the last 20 or so passed from being a vegetable due to a degenerative disease.
One of the worst condemnations for those of the speed of thought, of vitalism, of restlessness to want to do, to say, to express oneself, on pain of stalling to be avoided at all costs, he had created a style; certainly following a natural inclination.
You can start from the real name: Maria Luisa Ceciarelli. From the date of birth: November 3, 1931. From the countless anecdotes told and known: “The dust of the stage corrodes the soul and the bodyRepeated by mother to daughter with artistic ambitions, although not too beautiful, indeed too tall and with big feet. In short, from the many things that in recent years, at the stroke of every birthday, they re-read and fixed in memory.
Instead it went that, when it comes to taking stock, one would like to do exactly the opposite. That is, in the face of a colossus like Monica, one could avoid listing the slogans to sketch out the personality. Yet safe landing places are useful, something and more of the character they say. And then he left the last colonel of the Italian comedy? Yup.
But also the queen of two worlds, comedy and incommunicability. Few actresses have happened to hold the scepter of two realms. Meryl Streep is always a good dramatic performer, Garbo laughed onceSophia Loren has come to Hollywood to the sound of lessons and despising.
Not her, with the good fortune of meeting mentors capable of glimpsing attitudes and originality, she goes through voiceovers – a sort of pastime including Dorian Gray of He shouted – directly to Cannes. She wasn’t cut out for the cinema, she says, but there in the anvil between the 50s and 60s, at the opening of a decade that sweeps everything away, she is the right body and (hoarse) voice.
Alberto Sordi, Vittorio Gassman, Ugo Tognazzi, Monica Vitti, Nino Manfredi in 1990. (Ipa)
Fiercely binary: neurosis or laughter
With The adventureThe night and The eclipse by Michelangelo Antonioni, director and companion with whom he spends the summers in a domed house in Sardinia (now a destination for constant film tourism), it becomes the bourgeois from ’60 to ’63 very disturbed by events, from the wind, from incomprehensible feelings and a general disaffection. Of the times, of the economic boom. It is the antenna that directs and shows a common condition of alienation. Nothing corresponds to the insidehowever, all of the outside speaks of the inside.
On American campuses where European films pass like today, we watch with ecstasy the Third World cinema, says Camille Paglia, the crooked, mysterious face of Vitti, who walks aimlessly, speaks to young people like the Rolling Stones. Is it something modern, strange – a blonde Italy? Even slightly cross-eyed – but understandable. Then there are traces of sufferingof possible youthful thoughts of suicide, which he will confess.
The famous trilogy – with in the head The adventurefilm born from a trip to an island with Michelangelo – turns it into an exciting name. He works in England with Joseph Losey, with Bunuel, with Jansko. In the middle of Red desertapex and closure of a nature-neurosis modality now plundered by parody.
The stereotype of the tormented one makes Mario Monicelli jump him with The girl with the gun. Entry into the world of comedy in which he is at ease as if to act while torturing angora sweaters. It does not deteriorate, nor does it betray. It’s always her, another face, without effort and without psychological defenses. In the brilliant genre he then becomes a colonel, as great as Tognazzi, Gassman, Manfredi and Alberto Sordi, with which he forms a successful partnership. The audience loves her because she doesn’t act but she looks like one of them.
It closes, not quite, when the genre is already knocking on the pecoreccio, The duck with orange by Luciano Salce – 1975 – is dangerously in the balance. In the drawer, a decade collection of very precious titles: Drama of jealousy, that’s the way women are, I married you for joy from Ginzburg, Tosca by Magni with Proietti, Teresa the thief (“Italy is made to fucking dog”). Also a return to Michelangelo’s breast The Obenwald mystery. And a lot of theater.
Now you might end up with the rewards: 3 Ribbons and 5 David di Donatellothe Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 1995. Someone jokes that Monica Vitti left during Sanremo, unbearable even to one who is gone with her head. A joke that maybe she would have made too.
Now, Sanremo is not the night of the Oscars with the segment In Memoriumbut if last night’s lightning tribute to Franco Battiato was an indication, God spare us the speed of the memory (with landing-style applause) that will be given to Monica tonight. Or the prosopopoeia, given that the direct lack a few hours. A nice solution? The audience that pays homage to Monica by slapping herself, as in My love help me. Obvious with reversal of the parts, the woman leading the man. We are not barbarians like we were in 1969.
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