C.who knows what it’s like to see him again. It’s only been four years since I’m back, film about the surreal return of Benito Mussolini, came out in the cinema. In the meantime the world has changed and who knows if the “belly” of Italy has remained that. However, a little to laugh, a little to reflect (hopefully more to reflect), the film deserves to be reviewed. It airs tonight at 21.20 on Canale 5. The director is Luca Minierothat of welcome to the South. To impersonate the Duce a sensational one Massimo Popolizio.
The paradox: the return of the Duce is not frightening, but sympathetic
We are in the field of comedy, but in this film, after all, there is little to joke about. Because the fictional story seems to describe reality too well. I’m back is inspired by the German film of 2015 He’s back, which speaks of the hypothetical return of Hitler to today’s Germany. Adapted to the Italian context, tells the return of our dictator, Benito Mussolini precisely. The paradox is thatinstead of arousing horror, fear, contempt, the Italians described in the film have fun, joke about it and acclaim the “resurrected” Duce not only with kindness, but also with sympathy. Almost with admiration.
I’m back: the plot
It all starts with Benito Mussolini falling from the sky in Rome in front of the Alchemical Door, considered a point of contact between the world of the living and the afterlife. We are in 2017. Mussolini, the same as it was in 1945still in uniform, chest out, honor and respect (his motto, not the series with Gabriel Garko), bewildered by modernity, meets Andrea Canaletti (Frank Matano), a director who mistakes him for an exceptional comedian. “You’re identical,” he keeps repeating to himself.
Together they travel around Italy. The director with the hope of making a career, the dictator with the sole objective of probing how Italy became and regaining power. “I want to remake the empire, it went badly, now I want to adjust the game”, He says. Then he goes “boom” by pretending to shoot a person in the head. Scares? For nothing. Indeed, those who meet him mistake him for an irony, applaud him, it almost shares what it says.
And the rediscovered Duce says things to make you shiver, like: “Would you agree with a dictatorship?” People: “The dictatorship yes, but a little free.” Him: «A party». People: “Two at most.” Then endless laughter.
Massimo Popolizio in the role of Mussolini. (Photo by Claudio Iannone)
The “resurrected” Mussolini becomes a star
Everyone takes him for a cabaret phenomenon, very nice. Likes him so much that he becomes a popular character. Depopulated on TV, talk shows compete for him as a guest. He even goes to the studio from Enrico Mentana and Alessandro Cattelan. Over time the media make it one star.
He on TV says the worst of the politically scorrect: “Immigrants, if you have a mouse in your house, don’t call a comedian, but a pest control.” Or: “Democracy is a rotting corpse.” Then his sociological analysis: “When the crisis is felt you want not to think, you want to laugh, that’s why in 1940 we produced comedies, you were a people of illiterates, I find you a people of illiterates, with your head in a telephone, you are dreamless, alone, envious, full of resentment ».
Difficult to blame him. And what is your recipe? To exploit his charisma, the power of the media, the popular ingenuity, for his climb to return to power.
Massimo Popolizio.
I’m backbetween populism and the media
It is a film about populism. Onpeople’s dissatisfaction that in order to change, it collides with the worst. It is a film aboutimmaturity of voters. But also onmedia opportunism, that in order to make an audience make the monster an idol. On the other hand, “hitting the monster on the front page” was (and is) one of the rules of communication. And if people fall in love with the monster, never mind. Side effect, let’s say.
Italians with Mussolini want selfies
The film is not intended to be a critique of Mussolini’s ideology and fascism. “We did not judge Mussolini, we used him to observe the reactions of the Italians,” explained Luca Miniero. Indeed some scenes are born as true candid cameras, which reflect the spontaneous reactions of people in front of the hypothetical Benito Mussolini. Smug reactions, in fact. It turned out “That the Italians judge the Duce with a certain indulgence”, Miniero said, ‘It is not taboo like Hitler in Germany. Let’s not forget that Mussolini invented propaganda by exploiting the media. It is the emblem of populism ». «Looking at the German film it is clear that the Germans in front of Hitler are disgusted “, Popolizio specified, “The Italians, on the other hand, want to take selfies with Mussolini.”
The poster for I’m back. (Getty Images)
I’m backalmost a warning
This film was released in February 2018. A month later, on March 4, 2018, we went to vote to renew the Parliament. These are the last elections we voted on, those that led to the Yellow-Green government, the strange 5 Star – League alliance which he raised to the government Giuseppe Conte, the people’s advocate, today at the helm of the 5 Stars, who started back from a bloody split (on one side the Di Maiani, on the other the pure 5 Stars of Conte). Conte is the same one who today is asking for a showdown from the current Prime Minister Mario Draghi, keeping the government in the balance.
When the movie came out it seemed like a warning, almost as if to say: beware of the populist belly, it risks making monsters return. At the time, the warning went unnoticed. Who knows what effect it has today.
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