Customer Reviews

Mussolini and I

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

 

 

For anyone who can sit through the nearly 4 hours of this movie, there is the reward of learning a lot about a man who is a shadowy historical figure to most of us. Mussolini is shown as a complex figure, torn between the demands of his job and thos of his family. Key figures in this drama are Edda, Mussolini's daughter and Count Ciani, her husband, played compellingly by Susan Sarandon and Anthony Hopkins. At the beginning, Ciani is Mussolini's right-hand man, but eventually his anti-Nazi views put him at odds with his father-in-law. Both Edda and her mother are loyal to their husbands, despite the men's attentions to other women. The path of WWII is traced, and emphasis is put on the uneasy alliance between Mussolini and Hitler. This is an interesting and compelling story.

Competently written, edited, and photographed, this film does its job of bringing history to life.

Good performances, on the whole, with Bob Hoskins as a surprisingly sympathetic Mussolini.

My only major critisim is that it should have focused more on the politics of Ciano and his diaries. It spent to much time dancing on the outside of something he was an insider too. You learn nothing about pre war and wartime europe and italy except they lost the war and he was killed for betraying Mussolini.

I found this film to be a window into the Italian world of the 1930's and 40's. How the dictator went from being on top of things at all times to being a pathetic pawn of the very man that originally copied him, and how he had to chose weather of not to do away with EVERYONE who betrayed him, including members of his own family. This film did have a couple of technical problems, though. There were sections of dialogue that were dubbed over--and in other peoples voices. Also, many of the dubbings did not match at all with the actual lip movements of some of the more minor characters. However, the overall effect is of an outstanding cast all around; dramatizing outstanding times in Italy, and the sensational family divides that occur in the meantime. Hopkins, Sarandon, and Hoskins were all strong on the screen. The special effects were good, and the bombed-out street sets were very well done. The performance of Kurt Raab as Hitler is rightfully bone-chilling, and the man who played the elderly King Victor Emmanuel III was exellent as well. It was all shot in Italy, and in many places they filmed where the dictator actually worked and lived-- a big plus to me as a history student.

Four out of Five stars here.

I order this DVD August 13th and even if they send me an e-mail saying it was ship 2 days latter, I didn't receive this DVD for more than 3 weeks! I live in Montreal, Canada, not in Siberia!