★★★★½ - THE POST
- An instant Italian classic -
We are in Rome in 1946. The war against fascism is over, but the city is still an occupied – and preoccupied – territory. American and allied soldiers are present, guarding against any uprising that might fill the political vacuum before an election can be held.
That first post-war election will be an historic one. The people will choose whether to remain a monarchy or become a republic. And, for the first time, Italian women will be allowed to vote.
But even with all these momentous shifts in the currents of history happening on the streets, life in the poky and disheveled basement flat Delia shares with her husband Ivano and her three ungrateful children, remains stuck in the same rut it has occupied for years.
Delia keeps the house as clean as she can and cooks the meals. To raise a little extra money – some of which she holds back from tyrannical Ivano – Delia sews and launders for a few of her richer neighbours. Delia's only respites from her life are the delight she takes in teenage daughter Marcella and the bitter-sweetness of knowing she is the unrequited love of handsome mechanic Nino, who still gazes across his garage forecourt like a concussed Labrador whenever Delia walks by.
There's Still Tomorrow – back in our theatres for a welcome encore after slaying the box-office at this year’s Italian Film Festival – is a raucous and gritty slice of modern-day Italian neorealism. It is a film with a lot on its mind, but writer and director Paola Cortellesi – who also plays Delia – has a deft way with a scene and a line, and the film remains buoyant from the first frame to the last.
Delia survives in her own home like a resistance fighter in an occupied country. She smiles and does everything she can to keep Ivano from suspecting she would happily set him on fire and dance in the ashes, if the family didn't need the meagre wages Ivano brings home from his hated job.
But, a couple of things occur that might upend Delia's life forever. A friendship begins to blossom with a young GI, stationed at a nearby American base. And Marcella has caught the eye of a young man from a local family. A proposal has been made and tradition demands that Delia and Ivano will have to host a lunch for the far wealthier and abrasively ambitious prospective in-laws. Catastrophe seems inevitable.
Cortellesi's script and performance never diminish the bloody awfulness of Delia's life with a stupid and violent husband. But Delia's moments of escape, romance and rebellion also never seem manufactured or hollow. This is luminous writing, full of inflection and human detail. I reckon a second or a third viewing would be well rewarded, just to catch more from the unspoken moments that pass between Delia and her friends.
Around Cortellesi, Valerio Mastandrea gets beneath Ivano's boorishness and shows us a few glimpses of the elemental hunk he might have been, back when Delia first met him. Romana Maggiora Vergano (Those About To Die) is excellent as Marcella. And veteran Vinicio Marchioni is poignantly hilarious as lovelorn Nino.
There's Still Tomorrow is one of the best and most-entertaining films I've seen this year. It is a clever and happily scathing yarn dressed up in the frocks of a five-alarm weepie from an Italian golden age of cinema. The shimmering black-and-white photography only adds to the sense that There's Still Tomorrow is already a classic, rediscovered in some parallel Italian history.
Cortellesi and her crew have made something quite unforgettable here. If you haven't already, you should get along and see it.
- Graeme Tuckett, THE POST
There's Still Tomorrow is now playing at Light House Cinema!