Customer Reviews

Ciao, Professore!

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

CIAO, PROFESSORE is a film that deserves to be in everyone's collection. Every aspect of this utterly charming story is so well done that it feels perfect. Based on actual 3rd grade children's essays from a school outside of Naples, Italy, the script sings and dances in words that only children could have spoken. Lina Wertmuller takes this fine script and populates it with fine actors: Paolo Villaggio is inimitable as the Professor who comes form Northern Italy to the squalor of Southern Italy with all of the ideals of a dedicated teacher in place - or out of place, as he finds in the poverty and crime stricken city of Corsano; Isa Danieli is the coarse and world-hardened Principal of the school; and the children who begin as renegades and slowly enter a mutual transformation with the Professore are played by 'non-professional actors' gleaned from Naples. The children steal the show, so individual and committed are they to their roles. A film about poverty and misguided kids could be depressing, but Wertmuller and her fine cast make this a celebration of the human spirit without ever dipping into bathos. This is one of the finest movies about the teacher/student relationship that has ever been made -and that is saying a lot. Highly Recommended.

I saw this film several times - I was born and went to elemntary and grade school in Naples - as it reminded me all to well of both the incredible warmth, generosity and spirit of my fellow Neapolitans as well as the many evil and decaying aspects of life that persist. I was lucky enough to live in the City itself and go to a better school; however, the film is actually based on very real events and is merely somewhat adapted to ease the translation into film. The movie - and most of the dialogue - is based on a book that collected the essays of grade 3 students in the De Amicis school in Arzano, a poor suburb of Naples, in the late 80's. The teacher had collected the genuine and honest tales of life as precieved by his students. In the film the teacher comes from another city through bureaucratic error; in the book he's as Neapolitan as pizza. The excellent children actors - who were chosen among regular school children in Arzano (called Corsano in the film) - in fact use dialogue that is lifted directly from the essays. Unfortunately, to capture the full humor, knowing Italian is not enough, it's necessary to understand Neapolitan dialect and the psychology of Neapolitans. One of my favorite characters - apart from the briosche loving fat kid (I love briosche also) is the old and very sarchastic uncle who advises the baby that life is tough and hardly a collection of smiles. Like all Wertmuller's films, this one has a lot of humanity and is ultimately optimistic about the future of humanity. i suppose that's why she chooses so many of her film subjects among the very human people of Naples.

Ciao, Professore! is an absolutely wonderful Italian film dealing not only with the cleverness and light-heartedness of children, but also with the unfortunate political and social problems that rage in Southern Italy. The film, though distinctly European, does not assume too much of the viewer in any respect, and one has the opportunity to see how Italians view the North/South and regional splits that continue to fragment the country. The tale, following the exploits of a middle class teacher transferred by accident to a lower class elementary school, shows how the Northern teacher and Southern students gain respect for one another and reconcile their differences. The film is not afraid to comment on Southern problems that include crime, pollution, and poverty, nor on the people who endure these for the sake of their families and children. If you are tired of mob films that spin Italians in a negative light, come learn how wonderful these people really can be. An amusing comedy that the whole family can watch together...simple enough for children and sophisticated enough for adults. Five stars.

This movie, of a professore from the North, who gets transferred in error to a village outside of Napoli is a funny but sobering look at the conditions that the southerners had to live with and still do. You'll love the approach of the film to the societal problems of the south, you'll laugh and then want to cry, all at the same moment. If your family origins are from southern Italy, the memories of our dialect are unmistakable, enjoyable, nostalgic and funny.

This is a very touching movie. The story has been told in many ways, but somehow this movie shows a freshness of its own. A northern Italian teacher is sent to southern Italy (Napoli or a town near it) due to an error. Few of the children go to school because of economic and social difficulties. Il professore goes out to the streets and homes and drags the children to class. The children are mostly street smart wise guys. The movie is rated R due to a constant stream of crude language by the children, but don't let that stop you. (I would like to know what a fart jockey is.)

Eventually, the teacher and the children learn from each other profoundly, etc.

The acting more than makes up for the plot!

Enjoy!

A delightful tale told well about life in the ghettos of Naples and how kids get trapped into a life with no future. The amazing part of this film is that the children who played the parts of the ghetto kids were actually local kids from the ghetto with no acting experience! They do an acting job that puts most of Hollywood's kid stars to shame. All the acting was first rate as was the direction and technical aspects of the film.

Heart warming and very funny. Certainly worth seeing from both an entertainment and educational point of view.

Anyone who does not find this movie funny needs to have his/her head checked. I've seen it a dozen times and it still makes me giggle. I thought it was just because my family is southern Italian and I'm biased, but everone else I've shown it to has been equally moved. The children are not actors - they were chosen off the streets of southern Italy by the director - which makes their performances even more impressive and honest. It examines the problems of southern Italy through the eyes of its children, making the problems all the more devastating. Yet in the end the viewer is left with the innocence and hope only youth can provide. See this movie! You'll be an instant fan.

This movie is yet another proof that the exuberance of hollywood and its multi-million dollar productions, full of gratuitous violence and sex is not the path to follow to a great movie. The way the story is told, the sensibility of its interpretation, the superb work of Paolo Villaggio and the rest of the cast make of this movie one of my favorites. Indeed, not a recommend if you are an action movie person. For those of you who liked touchy, intelligent, profound movies, refrain not.

This is a fantastic film that really encompasses some of the less fortunate areas of Naples. I do not reccomend this film to Non-Italian speakers because the English subtitles don't do it any justice. For that matter I don't even reccomed it to Non-Neapolitan speakers.(Neapolitan by the way, is the dialect of the city of Naples). It is very different from Italian, so even to Italian speakers it can be a different language. I grew up in Naples myself and attended pre-school, elementary-school, middle-school, and part of what we would call high-school there. Although I was fortunate enough to grow up in a nicer area than the one portrayed in this film and go to nicer schools, it still very much deals with the ongoing problems of southern Italy. It can seem like a childish film, however it is very complex and has many underlying themes within it. This film was originally titled "Lo speriamo che me la cavo" hence the last line that Raffaele says in the film, however I think they changed it to "Ciao, Professore" so that Non-Italian speakers could actually pronounce it. A great film, and another great perfomance by Paolo Villaggio.

This movie, the story of a teacher from an upscale area who is mistakenly assigned to a poverty-stricken school, is heartwarming and very funny. The acting is superb; the children are street kids who quickly win your heart as you get to know each one's distinct personality and life's story. I am trying to learn to speak Italian, so it serves a double purpose for me. I've watched a number of other Italian movies, which were enjoyable, but this one I watch again and again.