Verführung auf italienisch (1964)

Verführung auf italienisch: Directed by Pietro Germi. With Stefania Sandrelli, Saro Urzì, Aldo Puglisi, Lando Buzzanca. A desperate Sicilian man, whose 15-year-old daughter was seduced and impregnated by his older daughter’s fiancé, tries to find a way to save the family’s honor.

“Criterion Collection was generous enough to introduce me to Germiu0026#39;s works, first starting with Divorce, Italian Style. It was only natural that I followed up with Seduced and Abandoned, since I was blown away by Divorced, and had a newfound love of contemporary European cinema, especially from French and Italian filmmakers. I know itu0026#39;s relatively simple to find out about little gems of work from foreign directors (using IMDb, for example), but Iu0026#39;m grateful for a company like Criterion to steer me in the direction of fantastic films and the visionaries that create them. Saves me a lot of time and effort, haha.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eNow, Iu0026#39;m just some random nobody in his early 20u0026#39;s, born and raised on the prairie of Western Canada. In a sense, I may not be as u0026quot;culturally perceptiveu0026quot; as someone hailing from a direct Old-World European background. But to discover a film such as Seduced and Abandoned, it was a guaranteed shock to see the enormity of differences between the values, traditions, and customs of Sicily compared to what I grew up in, astonishing since these worlds are separated only by a couple generations! Then again, forced marriage might be as frowned upon nowadays as if someone from that era might look into the future and see the overwhelming divorce rate of ours! Itu0026#39;s really a subjectivity of time, where a brilliant, neorealist director, not unlike Germi, of our time will be able to capture a kind of absurdity in the way we deal with (or possibly lack thereof) now common principles and practices, such as infidelity, polygamy, same-sex unions, etc.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIu0026#39;m rambling. Seduced was a depressingly good movie. Sardonic and whimsical at the same time, this one had the ability to leave a bittersweet taste with me afterward, to not dismiss the ideals held in Sicilian culture a couple generations ago, but to ponder them, to compare them to the beliefs and mores of our generation.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eSandrelli was phenomenal, as always. And Iu0026#39;m glad Germi cast Saro Urzi as the father instead of some North American counterpart, like Borgnine… Added to a certain authenticity that I wouldnu0026#39;t find if thatu0026#39;d been the case.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eLando Buzzanca as Antonio, and Leopoldo Triste as the Baron were amazing as the kind of actors that kept the comedic ball rolling in this type of film; although Seduced is known as a key player in the Comedia du0026#39;all Italiano, without these laugh-out-loud performances, the film would be a depressing portrayal of old Italian values and nothing but.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI look forward to the day when a company like Criterion will release more of Pietro Germiu0026#39;s film works (undoubtedly his 1950u0026#39;s dramatic working class oeuvre), to an international audience…u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eUntil then.”