By MARIAROSARIA FABRIS*
Notes on Paola Cortellesi's debut film
In the darkness of a modest bedroom, a man wakes up and his first gesture is to slap the woman who, lying next to him, had just woken up and wished him a good morning. She, “indifferent”, combs her hair, changes her clothes, puts on an apron, while a song – which speaks of the blossoming of the first red rose, the first violets that bloom, the first swallow that circles in the sky, and invites us to open the windows – sounds in the air.
And it continues to announce that it is spring, in a literal and metaphorical sense, because it is when the dreams of young women in love are renewed, along with the hope for a future of love.[1] There is a stark contrast between what the song's lyrics say metaphorically and what is not said but shown, that is, how the protagonist's life unfolds from the first hours of the day. This is one example of the multiple functions that music plays in this film.[2]
Meanwhile, the woman opens the windows of the various rooms in the half-buried apartment, revealing, at the same time, the public space (legs passing by, like in a Nanni Moretti film;[3] a dog urinating near the window frame; the building's courtyard) and the familiar one, in which she is preparing breakfast, waking up her children, preparing snacks and being threatened by her husband for allegedly breaking the toilet cord.
When the two boys finally go to school, Marcella (the teenage daughter) to her job as an ironer and Ivano (the father) to his job as a grave robber, the father-in-law complains about Delia's delay in serving him breakfast. While his daughter-in-law comes to his aid, Mr. Ottorino Santucci tries to touch her and reprimands her for not learning to keep quiet when she reminds him of his past as a usurer. A mobile desk calendar displays the date of that sunny May morning – Tuesday, the 14th: therefore, as the song announced, it is spring (in the northern hemisphere).
Although Ivano accuses her of doing nothing and neglecting the home, Delia's journey has barely begun, because, outside the house, she has several obligations to fulfill. Going out into the courtyard, she delivers a sandwich to one of the condominium residents, Alvaro, and, over the image of the housing complex, the title of the film appears: There's still tomorrow, whose translation into Portuguese, We still have tomorrow, refers to hope for the future, leaving aside the idea that something can still be done concretely the next day. The shot from a closer angle of the buildings surrounding the courtyard refers to the initial framing of the building in which it unfolded A Special Day, with which Paola Cortellesi's production dialogues, starting with the protagonist's resigned air and, according to Carmen Palma, by taking advantage of the lesson from the beginning of the plot:
When, in 1977, Ettore Scola entered a popular condominium in the first minutes of a very special day, he did so slowly, in a calibrated manner, showing us the details of the protagonist's house, the family's awakening, the first household chores, breakfast, all those rituals that can be transferred to a larger social plane, the uses and customs of a distant time.
Upon reaching the street, the camera, which follows Delia's measured walk towards her jobs – to the sound of Calvin (1999), by the New York rock band Jon Spencer Blues Explosion –, reveals the neighborhood in which she lives, Testaccio (a traditional working-class Roman neighborhood on the left bank of the Tiber River)[4], focuses on its inhabitants, the walls graffitied against the royal house and in favor of the Republic, the still precarious public transport, the presence of military police in patrolling the city. Although this last detail plays an important role in the film, mainly because it characterizes well that the plot develops in the immediate post-war period, some have wondered if, in mid-1946, the military police still circulated around Rome.[5]
The presentation of the neighborhood is over – which, in some way, resembles one of the long sequence shots of Rome (2018), by Alfonso Cuaron[6] –, Delia's steps become more hurried, somewhat out of step with the film's initial pace, which has as its backdrop the Italian capital still ravaged by the poverty caused by the war, where rationed food requires long lines to obtain it. This is not the case for those who managed to get rich on the black market, such as the Moretti family, owners of the best local bar, whose son Giulio is dating Marcella, to the satisfaction of his mother and great joy of Ivano, who sees his daughter's marriage as a chance for social advancement.
Accompanying Delia in the small extra services she provides means delving a little deeper into the social issue and, above all, the role of women in that period. It is interesting how, instead of adopting a pamphlet tone, Paola Cortellesi, thanks to small details, small notes, manages to weave her discourse on class and gender disparities.[7]
While administering injections in a wealthy household, our protagonist is faced with a sumptuous breakfast, quite different from the two pieces of bread and a slice of cheese that she serves to each of her family members, but she is also faced with the same disrespect towards women that prevails in her home. “Honey, shut up,” says the bourgeois husband to his wife, when she tries to support her son’s opinion on the need for changes in society.
On her second stop, Delia delivers the underwear (bras and garter belts) she repaired at home to a haberdashery. When she asks her boss if she has any frayed stockings to repair, she haughtily replies that she will throw them in the trash, while the housewife wore them throughout the war.
The owner of the haberdashery store, however, also faces male discrimination, as will happen later, when a zipper salesman asks to speak to the owner of the establishment and, upon learning that he has to deal directly with her, mumbles something about the fact that women, for the past year, have been showing their sleeves.
Delia's third job is at a shop that sells and repairs umbrellas. While teaching an apprentice how to assemble the item in question, she learns that he earns more than she, who has been working at this job for three years. When she complains to the owner, she is told that the other one is a man.
And finally, at home, another job awaits her: washing bed linen and table linen for wealthy tenants, who use the building's elevator, while she climbs the stairs to the terrace, carrying the large tub of laundry to be hung. Once up there, Delia and the other two comadres, who are doing the same job, help each other when it comes to hanging up or taking down the large double sheets, in yet another sequence that seems to allude to the aforementioned Ettore Scola film.[8]
During one of her wanderings, our tireless character comes across a photograph of a black family on the ground, near a checkpoint for a US patrol. When she sees a black soldier anxiously searching for something, she deduces that the photo can only be of him. Grateful, the foreigner introduces himself, William, offers her two bars of chocolate and says he owes her.
In the sphere of Neorealism, so often evoked when talking about this debut film by Paola Cortellesi, the relationship between black North American soldiers and the Italian population has always been troubled and overshadowed by tragic events, such as the Neapolitan episode of Paisa (paisa, 1946), by Roberto Rossellini, or in Mercilessly (No mercy, 1948), by Alberto Lattuada, which, with the social marginalization on both sides, left a bitter taste in the viewers.
Em We still have tomorrow, Delia, upon meeting William, is a little suspicious, but, little by little, she calms down and, in the end, these two social “pariahs” (from the photo, we can deduce his origin and, from the marks on her body, the soldier understands that the woman is a victim of violence) will know how to turn things around.
At the local street market, the housewife chats with Marisa, a fruit and vegetable vendor (who always manages to slip some merchandise into her friend's bag). She tells him about her encounter with William, and the two end up talking about the beauty of Americans, who have all their teeth, many more than Italians. Finally, they talk about Ivano, who, having fought in two wars, suffers from nerves (this is the eternal excuse he gives for his outbursts of aggression towards his wife) – the violent grave robber is contrasted with the figure of the market vendor's sweet husband, who, however, considers him mentally challenged.
This sequence, with the market vendor advertising his merchandise and his wife leaving the customer who owes him money in the lurch, brings to mind the film Field of flowers (Each one with their own destiny, 1943), by Mario Bonnard, one of the predecessors of Neorealism, with its filming in real settings, its performers linked to the revue theater, its popular characters who expressed themselves in regional speech: filmed in the picturesque open-air market of the square (which gives its name to the film) located in the heart of the city, the production featured Aldo Fabrizi and Anna Magnani in the roles of a fish seller and a vegetable seller.
Critics have tried to establish a link between Paola Cortellesi's interpretation (but one could also think of Emanuela Fanelli's characterization of Marisa) and Anna Magnani, generally recalling their performances in Rome city open (Rome, open city, 1944-45), by Roberto Rossellini, or in The fur is fantastic (Wonderful, 1951),[9] by Luchino Visconti, when in fact they should have been pointed out before The Honorable Angelina (Angelina, the deputy, 1947), by Luigi Zampa, or the aforementioned film by Bonnard, thus establishing a line of continuity between the realistic comedy prior to the emergence of the new cinematographic trend in the second post-war period and the so-called minor (or pink) Neorealism, until it culminated in the Italian comedy, which was gaining ground in the 1960s.
In any case, the two modern actresses do not seem to have, in a good way, the histrionic personality that characterized Anna Magnani, who was constantly oscillating between a more blatant comedy and an intense, sometimes excessive, dramatic nature. This is not a criticism, but rather an acknowledgement that new times call for different types of interpretation. In the construction of Delia's process of awareness, with her performance, Paola Cortellesi knew how to create a character who is constantly disoriented, with marked wrinkles, a tired look that denotes her restlessness, but also with a bright smile, at times when she is relaxed.
On her way home, Delia passes by the mechanic's shop of Nino, an old boyfriend who, thirty years ago, let her go and regretted it. It is clear that there is still some feeling between the two, but the housewife avoids his advances by keeping quiet. In the most romantic sequence of the film, she shares with the mechanic one of the chocolate bars she was given. As soon as each of them puts a piece of chocolate in their mouths, almost simulating a kiss, and they both start looking at each other intensely, the camera starts to spin around them to the sound of I really fall in love (1999), by Fabio Concato, in which a man experiences strange sensations in front of the woman he knows he will fall in love with.
It is a moment of enchantment at their reunion, but at the same time, they are both aware that they have been defeated by life, as there is despair on her face and melancholy in his eyes. Even the smile they exchange is veiled with sadness: their teeth are both stained with chocolate, black, as if they were decayed, of people who have suffered, in contrast to the perfect white dentures of the Americans.
It is interesting to note that this sequence caught the attention of professionals in the field of dentistry, such as Gianna Maria Nardi who, when highlighting the importance of smiling in human relationships, highlighted “the great emotional intensity” of this moment in which the two exchange an “intense, slow and deep smile, although not white and luminous like the smile of American soldiers, stained with chocolate”.
If the idyllic moment had taken place a few months later, or better still, in the middle of the following year, one might think that it was based on one of the photo novels of the period, love stories in comics – photographed, as the name itself indicates –, published by weeklies such as Dream e Grand Hotel, read mainly by women, whether from less privileged social classes or from an impoverished urban petite bourgeoisie, whose interpreters came from the same social and cultural environment as their audience. In the documentary The loving lie (The lies of love, 1949), Michelangelo Antonioni explored this universe, with one of the protagonists being Sergio Raimondi, a former mechanic who became a great star of photo novels.
What draws attention to We still have tomorrow, it is not only the fact that Nino is a mechanic, as Raimondi was in Antonioni's film and in real life, but also Vinicio Marchioni's characterization so that his character resembles that of the "divo" of the past. And, since Delia and Nino say goodbye as if they were saying goodbye to a dream, it would not be risky to conclude that, as in the 1949 documentary, in this case also the romantic relationships are based on something illusory, they are governed by established social conventions, corresponding to stereotypical models.[10]
Back home, the housewife is entertained by three nosy neighbors who are doing small tasks in the yard. She also meets Marcella and Giulio, who are intent on getting their families together to make the engagement official. Despite her daughter's protests, she will take charge of the celebratory lunch, since, as tradition dictates, it is the bride's parents who welcome the groom's parents.
Upon entering the building, the caretaker wants to deliver some correspondence to her, but Delia says quite naturally that it is her husband who will take care of it, since, at the time, any epistolary communication was subject to the scrutiny of the paterfamilias. Faced with the caretaker's insistence, she takes the letter and asks her not to mention anything to Ivano. In the bedroom, after having read it, she hides the paper in one of the drawers of the sewing machine, along with some change that she regularly takes from the money she earns before giving it to her husband.
Later, her daughter criticizes her for inviting Giulio's parents, because she is ashamed of her family and the poverty they live in. Soon after, Ivano comes home from work with his shoes covered in dirt and, as usual, starts complaining about the little money that mother and daughter bring home, which barely covers the bills. His wife tries to convince him that this is not the case and, to calm him down, tells him about the engagement lunch.
The husband, after lamenting that with Marcella's marriage there will no longer be a woman in the house, runs to the window so that everyone can hear that his daughter will make a good marriage and will have a different standard of living, unlike the starving people in the condominium. Meanwhile, the brothers who share one of the beds in the room where the girl also sleeps are already arguing over the possession of the available bed.
To celebrate, Delia decides to share the other bar of chocolate, but Ivano, who is suspicious of his wife's behavior in order to get it, locks himself in the room with her. And here begins one of the most surprising sequences in the film, as a routine situation is shown in a stylized way, transformed into a kind of choreography, without losing its violent charge.
According to Ester Annetta, during this session of abuse, “each mark – the blood, the swellings – appears and then quickly fades, reabsorbing itself into an internal wound instead of remaining external.” In other words, each mark becomes a deeper and more lasting wound. The music, once again, serves as a counterpoint; only this time, at the end, it reinforces the feeling that the housewife is trapped in a vicious cycle.
In fact, the song Nobody (1959), by Antonietta De Simone (lyrics) and Edilio Capotosti and Vittorio Mascheroni (music), exalts a love that no one, not even destiny, will be able to separate because it will be illuminated forever by the infinite joy that it provides. A sweet love that represents the past and the future, that sums up in itself the entire universe of those who experience it (the beginning and the end). However, in the final verses of the song, the singer repeats, as if she were a stuck record, that “this love will be illuminated / for eternity / for eternity / for eternity / for eternity / for eternity”, shouting in an increasingly shrill voice.
In this way, what should have been an infinite happiness, turns into an eternal punishment to which Delia seems condemned. This feeling is corroborated by the replacement of the melodic line of the original composition by a more syncopated rhythm in the 2004 version by the duo Musica Nuda – formed by Petra Magoni (vocals) and Ferruccio Spinetti (bass) –, closer to the jazz style of Mina's interpretation, still in 1959.
The sequence generated contrasting opinions, however, as stated in the making-of official, the director did not want to portray her husband's brutality in a voyeuristic and the metaphor of dance seemed even more violent to him than the realistic performances present in so many films.
In their room, the children wait in fear for it to end. In the courtyard, the three nosy neighbors wait in silence, as if the pain of one woman were the pain of all women. As if nothing had happened, Ivano prepares to leave, helped by his wife, who perfumes him even though she knows he is going after a woman, which will cause the anger of his daughter who would rather kill herself than end up like her mother. And when she asks him why he doesn't leave, Delia, resigned, answers him, "To where?". Alone in the bedroom, she reads the hidden correspondence again and, after crumpling it up, throws it in the trash can. The next morning, the housewife, already awake but still in bed and looking indifferent, is checking to see if the bedside table is dusty, while her husband, satisfied with his own lust, says he still loves her and apologizes for the beating the night before.
On the street, Delia, like dozens of other women, is in line for rationed food, hoping to get some pasta other than noodles for soup, but in vain. On the way home, she meets William again, who realizes that she has been beaten, and stops at the street market to talk to Marisa, who invites her to have a coffee at a bar. Afterwards, they smoke, talk about life and Delia confides in him that she managed to save 8.000 lira for her daughter's wedding dress. It is a short sequence, almost a pause, which, thanks above all to the unpretentious performances of the two actresses, acquires an unusual freshness (as in the scene of the three housewives on the terrace, collecting clothes from the clothesline).
In the courtyard of the building, as usual, the old men are playing cards and the three neighbors are working and chatting. One of them offers to lend the tablecloth for the engagement lunch, which triggers a fight, as another speaks badly of the groom's family. Next, we see Delia busy with the preparations, while Marcella tries to calm her siblings. The grandfather will be locked in the room and the father will need to be policed so as not to spill his glass. The arrival of the Morettis, all well dressed and politely bringing a tray of sweets, underscores the great difference between the two families, although the groom's father also tells his wife to shut up when they start talking about elections.
Lunch is doomed to failure: the baked pasta was prepared in the simplest way, without many ingredients other than the soup noodles; the meat served is of poor quality; the father drinks too much; the grandfather, whom they forgot to lock in his room, appears walking (much to the family's surprise) and throws in Moretti's face the infamous past of the bar partner, who denounced dissidents to the Nazis; Delia, trying to get around the situation, offers to serve the desserts, but when she trips, she drops them on the floor, breaking a plate inherited from her mother-in-law on top of it, which upsets her husband. The atmosphere becomes tense and Giulio, to lighten the mood, suggests they go get ice cream at his father's bar. Ivano says that he and his wife will go next and, after everyone has left, closes the bedroom door. The audience already knows what is going to happen.
At the bar, while the young people eat ice cream, the Moretti couple talk at another table about Marcella's tacky and ignorant family: the woman hopes that her daughter will make a better choice when she gets married, but the husband says that the choice will be his (the practice of forcing a girl to marry was still very common). A worker, who puts up some posters near the bar, irritates the owner, who complains that they have been pestering him with that story for a year, without dissuading the poster.
The next morning, Ivano has a long conversation with his father, who advises him not to hit Delia too much, so that she doesn't get used to it. A good beating once and for all is enough. Furthermore, he feels sorry for her when he hears her crying. That's what he did with his wife and it worked. The son listens to him, head down and looking sad. Then he goes to the couple's bedroom, opens the door and, with all his strength, stretches his arm forward (towards the camera) and, in the foreground, we see not his clenched fist, ready to strike a blow, but his open right hand, inviting his astonished other half to dance.
And that's what they do, to the sound of Forgive me, my love (1960), by Umberto Bertini (lyrics) and Enzo Di Paola (music). As the two of them walk around the room to the beat of the song sung by Achille Togliani, memories of when they met during the First World War (his military uniform and the type of filming that recalls the early days of cinema in Italy confirm this), of their wedding in a humble little church, of their first slaps in front of their young children, emerge in parallel.
If the song invites a couple to forgive each other for the mistakes they have made, to love each other again as if they were one soul, to remember the radiant day of their first meeting that changed their lives, to recover their lost sincerity, in truth it would only be the husband who should ask his wife for forgiveness, if he could understand that his is a crooked way of loving.
Because he probably still likes her – just look at the pathetic expression on his face as they rehearse yet another dance – but at the same time, due to the education his father gave him, the environment that surrounds him, the years he lived under a phallocentric regime, he follows the values of masculinity that were instilled in him. He is the typical catfish head – or, in good Italian, head of the dog (literally translated: penis head), an expression in which the male organ indicates something of no importance whatsoever.
Thus, Ivano is also, in some way, a victim, like Delia, because they are both subject to social conventions that determine each person's roles. Not even Marisa, who appears to be freer, is exempt from them when she calls her husband a fool because he is cordial. In this way, what is being contested is the male status that many men are complicit in, because of their “rights” and the domination over women that they are granted.[11]
As psychologist Jacopo Pampiani stated, when encouraging men to talk about violence and to make a mea culpa regarding his relationship with women: “This film also talks about me as a man, about the male heritage that was passed on to me by men, which I have to deal with. If I truly believe that gender-based violence is unjust, it is my duty to confront myself with this film, to question myself and to do something to change things. If I don’t want to do it for myself, at least I have to do it for my children and for the teaching and/or model that I want to pass on to them, as a man in today’s society.”
The psychologist's concern about the legacy to be left to future generations is in line with the dedication the director makes in the film to her own daughter and the numerous statements in which she draws a link between the past and the future of women, starting from a modern point of view, as in the statement made to Rita Luzi: “Mine is a contemporary film set in the past: a tribute to the stories of my grandmother, who, in her Roman courtyard, collected the resigned outbursts of many women mistreated by their husbands-bosses. I want my daughter to know where we started from and where we have to go. I want her to learn never to take anything for granted. Our achievements cost tears and blood. We cannot let our guard down.”
Back to her daily routine, the housewife runs into the American soldier again, who, upon noticing, once again, marks of violence on her body, offers to help her out of that situation. Then, there is another encounter with Nino, who tells her of his decision to migrate to the North in search of better opportunities and asks her to accompany him. Delia, however, makes no promises. In the courtyard of the building, in the presence of neighbors, Giulio is at Marcella's feet, showing her his love, repeating Ivano's request when he met his future wife.
While she was busy with her romance, the girl left the pan with the potatoes from dinner on the stove, but her mother admits that she let them burn and takes care of them instead of her daughter. The children are silent in the living room, the neighbors are silent outside. The husband leaves the house and Delia, in the kitchen, prepares milk soup for her children. The daughter, indignant, asks him why she lets herself be treated like a useless rag. In the bedroom, she retrieves the crumpled sheet of paper from the trash can, smooths it out and, thoughtfully, hides it at the bottom of a small box on top of the dresser.
The next day, when delivering a new shipment of repaired underwear, the housewife sees a little jacket in the window of the haberdashery and, after some indecision, buys it, subtracting 300 liras from the money she was supposed to give her husband. Another meeting with the American, made up only of glances, and another visit to Marisa at the street market, to whom she asks that, next Sunday, if anyone asks for her after mass, she confirm that she went to get injections. At home, while she fixes the jacket on the sewing machine, she keeps an eye on her daughter's relationship.
Giulio doesn't like the fact that she's wearing makeup and is thinking about continuing to work after she's married. He smears her makeup and holds her tightly by the neck. Her mother just watches and then tries to dissuade Marcella from getting married, which is for the rest of her life. She reminds her that there's still time to give up, but in vain. In the courtyard, the old people talk about the future wedding, saying that until the Morettis have the bar, it will be good for everyone in the Santucci family.
The bar, however, explodes. After the explosion, William appears and sounds the alarm with his whistle, just as Delia, on the sidewalk in front, leaves the street. The repercussion is great in the condominium, people talk about the TNT load that destroyed the place and the hopes of the bride's family. While the father complains that they asked for the ring back, the daughter cries inconsolably and accuses her mother, who continues sewing on the machine, of not doing anything, but that's what she thinks. At night, the courtyard is deserted. Delia is ironing her jacket – the chords of And there will be miracles (1980) –, which she will put in her bag along with the correspondence she received, her lipstick, a sum of money and an envelope on which she wrote something with great effort.
He goes up to the terrace to smoke the cigarette that Marisa gave him, while her husband is playing cards somewhere. Above his pensive but serene face, Lucio Dalla's voice – singing of the city that moves collectively in its alleys and gardens, with people in the bars, which creates an atmosphere of communion – spreads throughout Rome, where the poster artists continue to work;[12] Young people are having fun outdoors; there are people in the streets; in front of the mirror, the owner of the haberdashery is taking care of her hair, Giulio's mother is taking care of her face; Nino is packing his suitcase; she smokes, looks at the moon and smiles. For Delia it is also a miraculous night, because the decision she has made will be a surprise to everyone.
In the morning, while the father and children are already leaving the house, the mother goes to take a peek at her father-in-law. He has passed away, but so as not to disrupt her plans (“Not today!” she exclaims), she covers him as if he were sleeping and leaves. In the courtyard, neighbors say they are going to vote; the family, however, is heading to church for mass. Alvaro, meanwhile, decides to check if everything is okay with Seu Ottorino and, upon realizing what has happened, shouting that the old man has passed away, he runs off towards the church, where the priest is recommending that the few faithful present that day act according to their conscience.
Delia is trying to get away from her family to go and “give the injections”, but Alvaro’s arrival thwarts her plan. Luckily for her, her neighbor is embellishing the information and will continue to do so all the time, so no one will know exactly when her father-in-law passed away. In yet another pathetic scene (with a perfectly histrionic Valerio Mastandrea), Ivano falls to his knees on the church steps, invoking his father, which underlines that he is representing his grief to those present.
In Mr. Ottorino's bedroom, his body is being laid out and some men present are praising the deceased, which causes the son to give some sidelong glances, disguised as the representation of pain continues. Marcella is crying, but not because of her grandfather's death, but rather because of the end of her relationship with Giulio. The little brothers are already eyeing the room that will be vacant.
Delia, who is serving coffee to everyone present, is worried about the time and about a possible misunderstanding with Marisa, which would prove that she lied. Her friend arrives with her husband, the two pretend to be surprised by the lack of coincidence and go to sit next to Seu Ottorino's deathbed, not to mourn his passing, but to tarnish his memory.
The housewife confesses her frustration with how the day went and the market vendor, thinking she is lamenting a failed romantic getaway, says it was better this way, that she has to think about her children, which, once again, shows that for Marisa, social norms are irreversible. Delia responds that she is thinking exactly about her daughter, but that she still has tomorrow.
In fact, the next day, very early, after watching over the deceased, she turns off the lamp, updates the calendar (it is June 3rd), leaves an envelope she took out of her purse on Marcella's bedside table, and looks at her sleeping children, as if she were saying goodbye. When she is about to leave, Ivano appears, but she convinces him that she will give him injections and earn some money so that his father-in-law can have a dignified burial. When she closes the door behind her, she doesn't realize that a piece of paper has fallen to the floor.
When they pass the caretaker, the two look at each other, and, on the street, the housewife quickens her pace – to the sound of BOB (Bombs Over Baghdad, 2000), of the American rapper duo OutKast –, runs to a bar to change (puts on her jacket) and paint her lips, flies past Nino's closed workshop, without even looking at it, and arrives at a square where there is a large crowd, especially of smiling women, many of them wearing lipstick.[13]
Meanwhile, in the apartment, Ivano finds the paper: after reading it, he crumples it up, throws it on the floor and quickly goes after the fugitive. Soon after, Marcella wakes up and finds the envelope near her bed, in which her mother left her the 8.000 lira previously intended for the wedding dress, for her studies, contrary to her husband's opinion that only sons had the right to study. Upon finding the crumpled paper on the floor, the daughter opens it and immediately understands what it is about.
In front of the school, the husband cannot find his wife; when she realizes that she has lost the paper, she does not know what to do, but notices movement behind her: it is not Ivano but Marcella who, smiling,[14] gives him the letter calling him to the election.[15] This is when the first notes of a song begin to echo, “Fatece largo che pass…”, but it is not the opening verse of the famous The society of pimps[16]; this is the beginning of two stanzas of With your mouth closed (2013), an exaltation of the protest, by Daniele Silvestri: “Fatece largo che / passa domani, che adesso non si può” (“Make way for / tomorrow it will pass, because now it is not possible”) and “Fatece largo che / passa il corteo e se riempiono le strade” (Make way for / the march and the streets will be crowded”).
And while the song proclaims that participation is freedom and resistance – resistance through speech, which is expressed even with the tongue cut out, because one can still sing with the mouth closed –, the women manifest their social presence, affirm their existence. In order not to invalidate the ballot paper, when sealing it, they remove the lipstick from their mouths: Giulio’s mother, the owner of the haberdashery, Delia, who, later, satisfied, on the landing of the school stairs, smiles at Marcella, but also sees a threatening Ivano.
She does not give in to the temptation to run away, but challenges the patriarchal order by singing with her mouth closed. Her solitary song becomes a collective chorus, of women and men alike, because, as journalist Anna Garofalo noted on June 2, 1946: “The conversations that arise between men and women have a different, equal tone” (statement reproduced by Giorgia Serughetti).
And so, there is no longer any mystery: the content of the letter addressed to Delia has been revealed and she, although hesitant at first, decides to be a full citizen, to be part of that group of women aged 25 and over who, on 2-3 June 1946, for the first time in Italy, had the right to vote and be voted for, to choose, like the other voters, the new political regime (Monarchy or Republic) and also, although the film omits it, to elect the 556 members (including 21 women) of the assembly responsible for drafting the country's new constitution, which would come into force on 1 January 1948.[17]
In the opinion of Ezia Maccora, judge of the Court of Milan: “The growth of awareness of one’s own living conditions is constructed with great care and efficiency. […] The discovery of the right to vote, to education and freedom, self-respect and love for one’s daughter are the salient moments of the social and cultural recovery that Delia slowly matures throughout the film, and in this she represents not only the many women, from any social background, who in the post-war period were discriminated against and submissive, but also manages to convey a clear message in favor of women who are still discriminated against and mistreated today: to seek, from within themselves, the strength to react and change their own destiny so that emancipation engages everyone.”
It is the praise of this anonymous mass of women that, according to Letizia Giangualano, attracted the public[18]: “For years now, we have been working to bring to light the stories of extraordinary women who have been trapped in the folds of history. Alongside them, however, there has always been a multitude of ordinary, silent women who have not left their place or their role, but from those cages have been an active part of a solid and invisible resistance. Women without a voice, without stories, except for the occasional curious case passed down within the family, women who have not taken to the streets to demand their rights, but who, by accepting oppression for the good of all, still teach us today that every achievement, every privilege is part of a path in which each invisible being becomes a mass in the collective. Not suffragettes, but voters. This film is a song for them […]”.[19]
A song that left the “private sphere” to acquire “a public, social, collective and political dimension”, one might add, in the words of Chiara Lanini. It was not an easy achievement, but a long battle that lasted more than half a century, on an official level, and continued on a personal level, because, as Flavia Schiavo recalls, physical and/or symbolic violence “was not recognized as a political, cultural or social problem, at most it was a private matter to be kept behind closed doors”, as the film clearly demonstrates with the various examples of women mistreated and/or silenced by their husbands or by another man.
In this sense, it is important that Mr. Ottorino's passing occurs on June 2nd. In the plot, he serves to threaten Delia's “emancipation,” but, on a symbolic level, his death signifies the death of patriarchy, machismo, and misogyny fueled by a phallocratic and extremely violent dictatorship, with which the Savoy royal house had aligned itself. That is why it was necessary for the old regime (the Monarchy) to die so that the new one (the Republic) could be born. And Paola Cortellesi ends up insinuating that the Republic was a choice of women. If it was not exactly like that, from Patellani's photo it seems undeniable that the Italian Republic was born a woman. A young, smiling, and hopeful woman.
Over the period records and the closing credits hovers the voice of Angela McCluskey interpreting The little things (2016), accompanied by the American instrumental duo Big Gigantic, which, by extolling the importance of the little things in life – “It's the little things in life that I feel” –, sums up the film's final message. A film that played on subtractions to surprise the viewer less familiar with the period on screen, relegating to almost insignificant details the antecedents and the dating of the final twist (by quickly passing over the graffiti, by not focusing directly on the posters calling for voting,[20] by not openly making a political-partisan speech, because changes come from within each person before flowing into the collective). A film that opted for an unorthodox ending, as the long-awaited “happy ending” was political and not romantic.
The reunion of Delia and Nino, followed on the same day by the arrival of the letter and, later, by the proposal to try a new life together, created false expectations in many viewers of a “… and they lived happily ever after”, which were unjustified.[21] Furthermore, this solution, so characteristic of the romantic comedy of the 1950s, would go against the proposal of We still have tomorrow.
In this genre, according to Renato Noguera, “the woman is the protagonist within a feminine discursive identity that transforms her into someone who can only be completely socially validated if she finds her match. […] she will not be complete without a ‘man’”. Paola Cortellesi’s speech goes exactly in the opposite direction, that is, to escape the common places that determine beforehand how a relationship should be. Commonplaces that can turn out to be a trap, which Delia knows well and from which she manages to free Marcella, by bombastically freeing her from marriage and showing her the path to emancipation. This in an apparently very popular tone, in which Delia's harsh reality is counterbalanced by “comic moments skillfully spread throughout the film to lighten the burden of a delicate and painful theme, without (almost ever) diminishing the moral scope of the work and the drama of the events dealt with”, in the words of Simone Tommasi.[22]
So how should we label this first film by Paola Cortellesi, if necessary? A drama, a comedy? If we think of a line of continuity, it could be classified as a bitter comedy, like I knew her well (I know this girl well, 1965), disenchanted reflection by Antonio Pietrangeli, master of Italian comedy,[23] about the female condition, which ends with the protagonist's suicide. This would lead to considering We still have tomorrow a breath of renewal in the comic genre, without disregarding possible dialogues with other aspects of Italian cinema, in particular.
The director herself admitted that in the first eight and a half minutes filmed in 4/3 format (classic window) she wanted to refer to the productions of the so-called Pink Neorealism, constantly re-shown on television, to immerse the viewers, also thanks to the use of black and white, the scenography, the costumes and other period props, in Italy in 1946. She then adopted the 16/9 format (standard format) and an anachronistic soundtrack, because, although she sought “a meticulous historical reconstruction”, she did not want to create a “nostalgia operation at all costs”, as Marcel Davinotti pointed out, despite the black and white images aroused by memories of stories heard in childhood.[24]
We still have tomorrow It's a good movie, maybe not a masterpiece (time will tell), but it's the “opera before purchasing,"(first production) of a director who, having conquered her space in the television, theater and cinema of her country as a presenter, actress, scriptwriter, etc., took her leap of faith, taking a swipe at Italian society. And a cat, as we know, usually lands on its feet.
*Mariarosaria Fabris is a retired professor at the Department of Modern Letters at FFLCH-USP. Author, among other texts, of “Contemporary Italian Cinema”, that integrates the volume Contemporary world cinema (Papyrus).
References
ALESSIO, Federica D'. “And Delia laughs. There's still tomorrow è il film-gioiello di Paola Cortellesi” (10 Nov. 2023). Available at:https://www.micromega.net/ce-ancora-domani-e-il-film-gioiello-di-paola-cortellesi>.
ANNETTA, Esther.There's still tomorrow” (Nov. 4, 2023). Available at: .
ARAUJO, Inácio. “Film portrays the feminist struggle in Italy in the 1940s”. Folha de São Paulo/Illustrated, July 11, 2024.
"There's still tomorrow” (Aug 26, 2024). Available at:https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/ C%27%C3%A8_ancora_domani>.
"There's still tomorrow – “Backstage ufficiale” (Nov. 13, 2023). Available on YouTube.
"There's still tomorrow, film by and with Paola Cortellesi conquers the box office: 1,6 million in 4 days” (October 30, 2023). Available at:https://www.rainews.it/articoli/2023/10/ce-ancora-domani-film-di-e-con-paola-cortellesi-conquista-il-box-office-16-milioni-in-4-giorni-6387223c-6009-4ae0-9cf3-f4deb64d549d.html>.
COLAMARTINO, Simona. “A southern film rifle There's still tomorrow”. Available at:https://mamachat.org/empowerment-diritti/una-riflessione-sul-film-ce-ancora-do mani/>.
COLZI, Arianna. “Dov'è stato giroto There's still tomorrow: i luoghi di Roma del film da record di Paola Cortellesi” (3 May 2024). Available at:https://www.fanpage.it/stile-e-trend/viaggi/dove-stato-girato-ce-ancora-domani-le-location-del-film-da-record-di-pa ola-cortellesi/#:~:text=Le%20location%20del%20film%3A%20i%20quartieri%20di% 20Roma&text=La%20storia%20di%20C’%C3%A8,una%20strada%20del%20quartiere %20Testaccio>.
COSSI, Rafael Kalaf. “The negative phallus”. Cult – Brazilian Culture Magazine, Sao Paulo, year 27, n. 308, Aug. 2024.
DALENA, Matteo. “La lunga marcia per il vote alle donne italiane” (June 1, 2023). Available at: .
DAVINOTTI, Marcel MJ Jr. “C'è ancora domani” (5 Dec. 2023). Available at:https://www.davinotti.com/film/c-e-ancora-domani/65018#google_vignette>.
FABRIS, Mariarosaria. “From documentary records to fictional construction in Michelangelo Antonioni’s early films”, in WOSNIAK, Cristiane; FAISSOL, Pedro de Andrade Lima (org.). Proceedings of full papers from the 11th International Seminar Cinema in Perspective and XII Academic Week of Cinema. Curitiba: Unespar/FAP, 2023.
GIACINTO, Maria Rosaria Di. “C'è ancora domani? Violenza di genere e di linguaggi”. Mediterranean Dialogues, Mazara del Vallo, n. 65, Jan. 2024. Available at: .
GIANGUALANO, Letizia.There's still tomorrow, how diverse is his life?” (7 Nov. 2023). Available athttps://alleyoop.ilsole24ore.com/2023/11/07/ce-ancora-domani/?refresh_ce=1>.
GOMES, Erik Chiconelli.We still have tomorrow” (July 26, 2024). Available on the website “The Earth is Round”.
“Gruppo Roma città aperta – Gli anni dellaguerra” (Nov. 2, 2023). Available athttps://www.facebook.com/groups/romacittaaperta/posts/24046727938306989/?_rdr>.
“I luoghi della Festa – 3. Franco Interlenghi e Ostia”. Fondazione Cinema per Rome. Available athttps://www.romacinemafest.it/it/i-luoghi-della-festa-3-franco-interlen ghi-e-ostia/>.
LANINI, Chiara. “It’s not romantic, it’s fine, it’s political.” Mediterranean Dialogues, Mazara del Vallo, n. 65, Jan. 2024. Available at: .
LOSANNO, Mariantonietta “The time is right: There's still tomorrow"(30 Nov 2023). Available at:https://www.doppiozero.com/il-tempo-giusto-ce-ancora-domani>.
LIGHT, Rita.There's still tomorrow, a star of Italian cinema” (Nov. 17, 2023). Available at < https://www.italianomagazine.it/cultura/ce-ancora-domani-un-gioiello-del-cinema-italiano/ >.
MACCORA, Ezia. “Review the There's still tomorrow”. Available at:https://www. questionegiustizia.it/articolo/recensione-a-c-e-ancora-domani>.
MARENGO, Barbara. “The perfect scenography of There's still tomorrow. Parla Paola Comencini (1st December 2023). Available at:https://ytali.com/2023/12/01/la-perfetta-scenografia-di-ce-ancora-domani-parla-paola-comencini/>.
NARDI, Gianna Maria. “The smile says: There's still tomorrow” (Nov. 20, 2023). Available at:https://www.managementodontoiatrico.it/a/attualita/nardi-201123/il-sorriso-di-ieri -c-ancora-domani>.
NOGUERA, Renato. “How has love been reduced to the romantic-monogamous regime?”. Cult – Brazilian Culture Magazine, São Paulo, year 27, n. 305, May 2024.
PALMA, Carmen.There's still tomorrow – review and historical context” (2 Jan. 2024). Available at: https://fratellosole.it/ce-ancora-domani-recensione-e-contesto-storico/>.
PAMPIANI, Jacopo.There's still tomorrow” (Apr 6, 2024). Available at: .
PINZAUTI, Leonardo; ASSANTE, Ernesto; DE SALVO, Salvatore, COMUZIO, Ermanno. “Music”, in Italian encyclopedia – V Appendix (1993). Available at: .
SCHIAVO, Flavia. “Ballerò anchors the sole, domani. Per tutte le donne.” Mediterranean Dialogues, Mazara del Vallo, n. 65, Jan. 2024. Available at: .
SERUGHETTI, Giorgia. “Perché parlare, oggi, di ritto al voco?” (5 Nov. 2023). Available at: .
TOMMASI, Simone. “C'è ancora domani – considerazioni sparse” (Nov. 17, 2023). Available at:https://www.sportellate.it/2023/11/17/ce-ancora-domani-cortellesi-mastandrea-considerazioni-sparse/>.
Notes
[1] This is about Open the window, by Pinchi (lyrics) and Virgilio Panzuti (melody), performed by Fiorella Bini (1956). Although the film takes place ten years earlier, the song proves appropriate, since Italian popular music still followed models from previous decades. In any case, in the mid-1950s, some composers were already paving the way for a new trend in its music, that of song writers (singer-songwriters), which would become established at the beginning of the following decade. At the same time, in the wake of the blues shouters North Americans, at the turn of the 1950s to the 1960s, the so-called screamers (“screamers", in literal translation), which proposed a rock and roll more moderate. The diffusion of the first juke boxes boosted the success of these young singers (Tony Dallara, Adriano Celentano, Mina, etc.), at the time those who most opposed the traditional melodic interpreters, among them Achille Togliani, present in the film. According to the entry “music” from the Treccani encyclopedia, “the real “'revolution'” took place in 1958, when Domenico Modugno, with In the blue painted blue (known worldwide as Flying), consecrated Italian popular music outside the country's borders.
[2] This concerns above all the songs that function as a kind of subtext and that are cited throughout this work, but the soundtrack is also integrated by the composer's original songs. Lele Marchitelli (Restlessness, The letter, Anxiety and pain, There's still tomorrow) and by Swinging on the right side e You know my great love, by Lorenzo Maffia and Alessandro La Corte.
[3] I refer to the final sequence of Bianca (Bianca, 1984), when Michele Apicella opens the curtain of a window in the room of the police officer who is interrogating him. As the environment is semi-buried, the camera focuses on a continuous coming and going of legs.
[4] Flavia Schiavo made a survey of the locations, most of which are located in the Testaccio neighborhood: the popular condominium, at 98 Bodoni Street; the blocking point of the military police, in via Flavio Gioia; the reconstructed old Testaccio market, in Piazza Testaccio; Nino's mechanic's workshop, in via Monte Testaccio; the shops in front of which women queue to receive rationed food, in via Antonio Cecchi; the Moretti bar (in a historic building dating back to 1914), in via Amerigo Vespucci 35. Some of them are located in other parts of the city: in the Monti district, the facade of the notary's house where the housewife gives injections is that of a building in via della Madonna dei Monti, but the interior scenes were shot in the Prati district, in an old apartment in via Cola di Rienzo; in the Parioli district, the haberdashery, in via Locchi 4; in the Torpignattara district, the umbrella shop and the place where the husband and his friends play cards; in the Trastevere neighborhood, the places where Delia and Ivano dated, and the church of Santa Maria in Cappella, where they got married; in the Monteverde neighborhood, the former Carlo Forlanini hospital with the scenic staircase of its morgue transformed into the polling station; in the Sant'Angelo neighborhood, the church of Santa Caterina dei Funari, where the Santucci family attends mass. The variety of locations made it possible to avoid the inevitable modernizations that even a historic city like Rome has undergone and to try to recreate the atmosphere of the 1940s. The same care was taken in the costumes, hairstyles, props, shop signs, means of transport, furniture and the setting of Delia's humble home, all built in a Cinecittà studio.
[5] The doubt arose in a Facebook group, “Roma città aperta – Gli anni della guerra”, but it was not resolved. In any case, on the website of the “Fondazione Cinema per Roma”, there is a statement by the actor Franco Interlenghi, who recalls the presence of the military police through the streets of Rome in October 1945, when it was being filmed Scuscià (victims of the storm), by Vittorio De Sica.
[6] This is the sequence in which Cleo and Adela, in order to reach a snack bar, run through the city center, captured in detail by the camera that follows the two maids' run.
[7] Inácio Araujo's comment, which disqualifies the film from a cinematographic point of view, is somewhat inappropriate, by suggesting that, in this case, art would have been replaced by ideology.
[8] This is the sequence in which, on the terrace of the building, Gabriele, a homosexual radio host, helps the housewife Antonietta to collect the clothes from the clothesline, which she then puts away in the tub she brought from her apartment. What unites the two films is, above all, their ability to reproduce the atmosphere of an era, rescuing small gestures of everyday life that have been lost over time.
[9] In any case, Beautiful, as the director told Arianna Colzi, “it was a source of inspiration for the film’s settings.”
[10] For further information on The loving lie, see my article in which I analyze Antonioni's first films.
[11] Psychoanalyst Rafael Kalaf Cossi has pointed out that, according to cultural anthropologist Gayle Rubin, the phallus is “the embodiment of male status, to which men consent, and of which certain rights are an inherent part—among others, the right to a woman. It is an expression of male dominance.”
[12] Although it is only a very short shot, the poster artists, with their vehicles and uniforms, bring to mind The Bicycle Thief (bike thieves, 1948), by Vittorio De Sica.
[13] If women, as Flavia Schiavo says, are “objects of control (over their bodies, their actions and behaviors, perhaps even over their dreams, stifled by mistreatment)”, constantly subjected to “social judgment”, then they have to “emancipate themselves from the role to which they have been relegated and forced by society. In the film, the lipstick immediately symbolizes this evolutionary and emancipatory impulse”, according to psychologist Simona Colamartino. And the cigarettes that Delia smokes in secret could also be added.
[14] This moment is important because, within the film’s plot, it is the first time that Delia and Marcella connect in a positive way. In Simona Colamartino’s opinion: “the mother-daughter relationship draws attention to the emotional legacy and intergenerational transmission of what has been experienced, not only traumatically, such as the abuse to which minors are exposed, but also of family values and roles. Through the connection with her daughter, a woman who thought she had no desire, was worthless, and had no more time becomes aware, while she sees in her daughter the light of change and hope. In this way, she finds time to make choices for herself and for successive generations. It is this complicity between women that frees us from our chains.”
[15] In Italy, in the past, every citizen eligible to vote received a letter of invitation by mail and, after voting, was given an electoral certificate; it was only in the year 2000 that the voter registration card was adopted (electoral card), which also records the turnout at the polls. Even today, voting is carried out on two consecutive days, generally on Sunday and Monday, but this can vary. Therefore, Delia, who is unable to go to the polling station on the first day, knows that there will still be time the following day.
[16] The society of pimps(The Society of Food Lovers, in literal translation), is a hymn to popular Rome, a bold exaltation of the habits of its inhabitants, recorded in 1962, but probably of older origin; its opening verse says: “Fatece largo che passaro noi” (“Make way for us to pass”). Its presence would clash with the tone of the film, as it is a popular exaltation and not a protest; yet another dribble by the director.
[17] Of the nearly 25 million voters who turned out to vote, around 13 million were women. Although the decree that sanctioned women's suffrage was dated March 10, 1946, the process had begun fourteen months earlier, which is why, in the film, men constantly refer to a certain unrest among women over the past year. The path taken by the right to vote, however, was longer, beginning at the turn of the XNUMXth century, according to Matteo Dalena.
[18] Between October 26 and 29, 2023, the week of its release, the film recorded box office sales of €1.656.742. In São Paulo, it premiered on July 4, 2024 and remains in theaters, probably thanks to word of mouth, as local critics did not pay much attention to it. According to Maria Rosaria Di Giacinto, the secret of the film's success lies in the director's intuitive ability to “treat such a delicate and dramatic subject with hints of lightness and irony”, as some critics have pointed out. For more information on its repercussion, especially in Italy, see the Wikipedia website.
[19] “The narrative is permeated by a perspective that values history from below, focusing on the experiences of ordinary people and their daily struggles”, also states Erik Chiconelli Gomes in an article published on this website, in which he analyzes the importance of We still have tomorrow in the light of historians Joan Scott, Sheila Rowbotham and Eric Hobsbawn.
[20] In an interview with Barbara Marengo, set designer Paola Comencini explained that the posters relating to the 1946 referendum could not be displayed due to copyright. This impediment contributed to a certain atmosphere of suspense created by the production.
[21] For Inácio Araujo, “it is difficult to swallow a script that is willing to deceive the viewer with insinuations of extramarital romance in order to jump to the central issue of the film, which, in fact, had not even been proposed until then”. This is a mistaken reading, since, due to the sequence of the two events that occurred on the same day, there would not have been time for Nino, after the encounter, to write and post a letter to Delia, which, in fact, neither on the first nor the second occasion, feeds the mechanic’s hopes. As for the central issue, the film’s great turning point, it was obviously hidden so as not to spoil the element of surprise, but several clues were sown here and there, announcing it from the beginning: Mr. Ottorino’s moving calendar, the graffiti on the walls of Rome, the activity of the posters that bothers Patriarch Moretti, the male grumbling against certain ideas of women, the parish priest’s warning, it’s all there.
[22] In the words of Federica D'Alessio, We still have tomorrow is a “film with a strongly popular soul, the first directorial work by an artist who grew up in cinema, also with a cinematographic culture strongly marked by the popular character”. This statement is complemented by the opinion of Mariantonietta Losanno about Paola Cortellesi: “Your directorial debut seems to be the synthesis of a previous and never interrupted reflection, expressed on more than one occasion. […] We think […] of your filmography, of the exploration of the dynamics of female desire in Something new (2016, directed by Cristina Comencini and performed by the duo Cortellesi-Ramazzotti), in the representation of the brain “back” – after having “run away” – in Excuse me if I insist! (2014), or in the war against job insecurity in But what does the brain tell us? (2019), both directed by Riccardo Milani. We still have tomorrow seems to be the compendium – not in terms of simplification – of a discourse begun a long time ago and of an urgency now irrevocable: a point of arrival and a point of departure. Of arrival because it arises, therefore, from thoughts already expressed in cinematographic precedent or not, and of departure because it is a first contribution in terms of direction. Paola Cortellesi operates in the field of Italian comedy with a sensitivity that manifests itself on the stylistic plane no less than on the thematic one”. The future director was one of the screenwriters of Something new (Something new), in which she starred alongside Micaela Ramazzotti, and the two films directed by her husband Riccardo Milani: Excuse me if I insist! (Excuse my existence) to But what does the brain tell us? (Mom is a spy). His activity as a screenwriter was always shared, as in the case of We still have tomorrow, in which he had the collaboration of Giulia Calenda and Furio Andreotti.
[23] According to Mariantonietta Losanno: “Italian comedy was the somewhat degenerate daughter of Neorealism, born as a ‘pacifier’ (pink Neorealism), a witness to a comforted and provincial Italy, little connected to reality. Then it grew, dug deep, became disturbing: from comforting it often became provocative. This is the direction in which Cortellesi worked: towards a comedy in which, behind the legacy of Neorealism and the satire of Italian comedy, the allegorical tale, the fable, shines through. The director does not renounce her humorous licenses; on the contrary, she modulates in a balanced way historical and social, political and existential, cultural and cinematographic motifs, harmonized in the register of a melancholic but effective critical humor.
[24] Paola Cortellesi did not want to emulate Neorealism, either by using black and white or for any other reason, because, to be neorealist, her film would have to have been shot in the heat of the moment. Furthermore, the dialogue with other more modern cinematographies and the constant use of anachronistic music, as already mentioned, constantly remind viewers of the period in which the director is crafting her discourse.
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