Till Marriage Do Us Part

Brilliant cast and unpredictable comedy - Seductive story line - Antonelli is at her best! - Michele Placido steals the show. An amazing story line that tells the secrets of two generations aristocratic and very eccentric family. The comedy is hysterical and very unamerican. Deals with human nature and the various sexual taboos that most american films would never dare touch. A young naive woman who has been raised by nuns in an orphanage realizes, on her wedding night, that she has married her long lost brother. Rather than create a huge scandal and lose the family inheritance they decide to keep the secret to themselves. The way the end being brother and sister is told through a wonderful flashback sequence. They cover up their secret by publicly taking a religious vow of chastity as a married couple. The young wife however although prude and conservative becomes very frustrated. Michele Placido plays the Chauffer that attempts to seduce her. A definite must see.

Convent-reared Sicilian Laura Antonelli is wed to equally Sicilian Alberto Lionello. Before they can consummate the marriage, they discover they are actually sister and brother. Appalled, but unwilling to admit the shame, they agree to live together, but never touch each other. However, Miss Antonelli, despite her prudish upbringing, feels the constant call of the flesh.

Luigi Comencini's sex comedy is set in 1908 through 1920, so there are references to Gabriele D'Annunzio's erotic work. Yet in the words of the character played by Michele Placido, the chauffeur who seduces Miss Antonelli, everyone is confused by words; the deed is simple and natural. In the midst of all the sniggering and high-flown talk set around the lack of anything to talk about, there are a couple of good comic sequences, and Lionello is quite funny, but mostly it's all about the stupidity.

Luigi Comencini made a couple of mildly entertaining films: La boheme with Barbara Hendricks and L'ingorgo. Mostly the tone is bitter-sweet, the colour scheme soft, somewhat washed out and the dramatic level is low. So it is here, with Laura Antonelli (her body could revive a dead man, I sometimes think) and Alberto Lionello playing this silly charade of brother and sister. Michele Placido has some fun playing the chauffeur--and how long does it take him to get her out of her clothes so they can have sex? The plot twists and turns would take too long to recount, and I don't want to use spoilers anyway. The scenes with Karin Schubert and the ladies who obsess over D'Annunzio are really tiresome and should have been deleted.

Laura Antonelli brings whole new dimensions to the word "luscious" in this movie. She makes the seemingly stock character of the barely-reluctant virgin come alive in her scenes with Placido, thanks to her big eyes and adorably trembling lower lip. And then there's that body...

In addition, "Marriage" has a lot of wry commentary on Italy of the early 1900s. The upper class were a ragingly nationalist bunch not unlike some sectors of the U.S. populace today. (It helps the enjoyment of the film if one knows who Gabriele d'Annunzio was.) A conscript's baleful response to a officer's 'fire them up' speech is the funniest line of the film, one I haven't forgotten.

I saw this in a little independent theatre, and went back for a second helping. If you can find this one on video, rent it!

I have seen that movie more than 10 times and most certainly will see it again. It is funny,witty, and elegant. That movie is about a young Italian woman (the beginning of XX century) who was bred without any knowledge of sex life. She is full of stereotypes about how a lady should behave and she is about to be a wife. Hwever, it is not so simple for her (of course). Speaking about genre, Mio Dio, Come Sono Cadutto in Basso is a parody of saccharine sentimental movies about 'real ladies', who know nothing about men, marriage, sex and so on. The actors are brilliant, especially the heroine. The lines are witty. I do not agree with the word 'mediocre' about it. I assess it as excellent and most definitely recommend that movie as a very good comedy, especially if you like to laugh at stereotypical ladies of the beginning of XX century.