Seduced and Abandoned

Not quite up to its predecessor, Divorce Italian Style (because it does not have the gift of Marcello Mastrioanni), this Pietro Germi film again uses the stunningly lovely Stefania Sandrelli as the lust object who reveals the absurdities of Sicilian manhood and society. Saro Urzi is the laughable patriarch driven to insanity and beyond by the imperative to protect his daughters’ virtue and his family’s honor. The comedy, however, is dark as the garb the women must wear, black as a nun’s habit but oh-so-shapely underneath. A dimwitted snake seduces the younger sister of his fiance, and then refuses the shotgun marriage because he wants to marry a virgin. All the men, from priest to fathers, agree that it’s the man’s right to ask and the woman’s duty to refuse, and that family honor is the paramount concern. It would all be simply hilarious, if it weren’t so pointed about the pathetic sexism of my paternal forebears. (1964, dvd, n.) *7*