Amazon.com Winner of the prestigious Golden Lion award at the 1998 Venice Film Festival, The Way We Laughed is another richly layered drama from Gianni Amelio, the acclaimed director of the multiple-award-winning 1995 arthouse hit Lamerica. A tragic tale of brotherhood, Amelio's ambitiously structured film spans six years (1958-64) in the lives of an illiterate Sicilian named Giovanni (Enrico Lo Verso, from Lamerica) and his younger, enigmatic brother Pietro (Francesco Guiffrida) as they seek a new life in the class-divided city of Turin. Divided into six novel-like chapters that cover one pivotal day in each passing year, this emotionally resonant drama reveals how the gradually successful Giovanni desperately wants Pietro to achieve respectability as a schoolteacher. But when a sudden murder forces each brother into moral compromise, Amelio's film evolves into a mysterious study of dysfunctional loyalty, charting the growth of postwar Italy as it charts the love and sacrifice that will change the brothers' lives forever. While it demands the viewer's rapt attention, The Way We Laughed is a satisfying film that offers no easy answers to its complex human equation. --Jeff Shannon
Brotherly bonds and love and secrets...March 20, 2008 Movie is set in Turin, Italy in the post-war poverty era of the 50's and 60's. Two Sicilian brothers immigrate to Turin - the elder is illiterate and the younger with promise to become a teacher and professor.
Movie is divided into six stories over the 1958 to 1964 time period titled (1) Arrivals, (2) Betrayals, (3) Money, (4) Blood, (5) Families. Giovanni, the older brother, moves from a kind hearted man in poverty to a tough labor boss who acquires influence (and not always with clean hands) to a family man trying to put his unsavory (?) past behind him.
Meanwhile Pietro, the younger brother, struggles to meet his older brother's admiration and expectations - he's shifty, he lies, he cuts class, he steals, he fails school - and all w/o his older brother's knowledge who is toiling in low paid jobs to pay for his brother's expenses. Pietro eventually eventually pulls it out and becomes the brother taking the high road.
The Brothers' love for one another, the secrets that they keep from each other, the different path that each man takes - all make this a fascinating story. However, I found that the movie left a number of nagging gaps for me in the story-line and character understanding/definition driving my movie rating.
superbOctober 2, 2007 A great film about poverty, morality, loyalty, love and the injurious effects of concealment and shame.
The Way We LaughedJuly 18, 2007 Amelio's despondent tale of two brothers seems to have been yanked straight out of Vittorio De Sica's playbook, with a dash of Biblical fraternal conflict to complete the picture. Lo Verso is a mesmerizing presence, as he touchingly conveys Giovanni's seemingly limitless love and naiveté. So, too, is Giuffrida, playing the mysterious, hard-to-read Pietro, who may not be everything he represents to Giovanni. A fascinating, puzzling study of loyalty and family bonds twisted by postwar Italy's unforgiving pace, "Laughed" will leave its mark on your heart.
Genesi di un fenomeno mafiosoApril 25, 2005 18 out of 26 found this review helpful
Nei panni di Amelio non avrei chiamato il film con quell'insulso titolo che non dice e non c'entra niente con la storia raccontata, io lo avrei chiamato: "Genesi di un fenomeno mafioso".
A quell'epoca la popolazione italiana usava ancora, nel linguaggio corrente il proprio dialetto. Cio' rendeva piu' evidente la diversita' di chi emigrava dal sud al nord che in certi casi diventava completa incomprensibilita'. Vi era poi un evidente differenza di stato sociale: di vera poverta' per l'emigrante, di precario e timido benessere per gli abitanti del nord. Ma proprio la precarieta' di quel pallido benessere appena raggiunto dopo i disastri della guerra, rendeva gli abitanti del nord timorosi e ipercritici verso i connazionali del sud che arrivavano pieni di speranze e illusioni spesso eccessive. Su di loro si e' quindi puntato un razzismo, purtroppo tra italiani, che e' durato per tutta una generazione e oltre. Per opporsi al razzismo che li emarginava i meridionali si sono trovati costretti ad organizzarsi in qualcosa di simile a delle confraternite, dove i piu' capaci, quelli che disponevano di qualche amicizia, provvedevano a creare le condizioni per poter trovare uno spazio vitale. Ma gli emigranti, soprattutto quelli dalla Sicilia, non erano impregnati solo del loro dialetto, lo erano anche della loro cultura, dove la presenza della mafia era gia' dominante. La mafia nasce appunto in sicilia come difesa della popolazione contro il latifondismo che si impadroniva di tutta la ricchezza esistente, ma all'origine era una organizzazione dedita alla solidarieta' tra i suoi adepti non una organizzazione criminale. E' solo a partire dagli anni "30, e dall'America (Chicago, ecc.), che parte la degenerazione verso il fenomeno mafioso che conosciamo oggi. Nel film, il limitato benessere raggiunto da Giovanni attraverso la sua organizzazione, e' dovuto alla sua bravura nell' organizzare i suoi conterranei; nel trovar loro un alloggio, un lavoro, un modo per inserirsi in quella societa' che non li voleva. Ma non era un "pizzo", una tangente, era una liberalita' che i suoi conterranei volentieri gli pagavano per il servizio che lui (nominato addirittura presidente) svolgeva. Ma e' impossibile non vedere in questa organizzazione la cellula embrionale di una cosca mafiosa. L'analisi approfondita di questo film fa intuire quindi che i due fenomeni, razzismo e mafia, sono quasi sempre strettamente intercorrelati.
Great MovieOctober 30, 2004 7 out of 12 found this review helpful
This is one of the best movies I've seen. The acting was great. The story takes a twist, but I think everyone knows what's going on. This is great Italian cinema. The cinematography is simply beautiful.
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