C’ERAVAMO TANTI AMATI (WE ALL LOVED EACH OTHER SO MUCH)
Italy, 1974, 125 minutes, Black and White/Colour.
Nino Manfredi, Vittorio Gassman, Stefania Sandrelli, Stefano Satta Flores, Giovanna Ralli, Aldo Fabrizi, cameos by Federico Fellini, Marcello Mastroianni.
Directed by Ettore Scola.
We All Loved Each Other So Much is a fine film by prolific director Ettore Scola. From the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s he directed a number of classic films which were very popular internationally. They include A Special Day, Passion of Love and That Night in Varennes as well as Le Bal.
The film opens with three friends during the Nazi occupation of Italy at the end of World War Two. It then traces their lives over the next thirty years. One is a porter at a hospital, the other is a film critic, another is in a loveless marriage. Into their lives comes an aspiring actress, Luciana, played by Stefania Sandrelli – and the culmination of her life is as an extra in a Fellini film.
The film also includes the history of Italian cinema during this period with Vittorio de Sica explaining some of the scenes of Bicycle Thieves and a re-creation of the Trevi Fountain sequence from La Dolce Vita which includes the presence of Fellini and Mastroianni.
The actors serve the film very well, Nino Manfredi, Vittorio Gassman and Stefano Satta Flores. As they age over the thirty years we see the changes in Italian society during those decades, the aftermath of World War Two, ordinary men, their lives, struggles, and the nature of friendship.
1. The quality of this Italian film? Its impact on an Italian audience, non-Italians? Its range of interest: people, social awareness, history, comic aspects of Italian life? How enjoyable? The focus of the title? The rueful and nostalgic tone that it took? Indication of themes?
2. The writer/director's interest in Italian films? His echoing of the styles throughout his own film? The irony of starting at the end, in colour and returning there with its effect on audience interest? The use of black and white photography for the first half of the film? The tribute to and imitation of Italian neo-realism? The imitation of Michelangelo Antonioni’s style for the sixties? The tribute to Fellini and having him re-enact a sequence from the filming of La Dolce Vitti? The overall tribute to the humanity and the sentiment of Vittorio do Sica - the imitation of his neorealist, social concern, focus on average human beings? The questions about him in the film quiz? The insertion of the interview material with his comments on Bicycle Thieves? A resume of Italian film styles over thirty years and a tribute to these? What did this contribute to the film?
3. How did this illustrate the scope of the Italian films in the post-war period? The particular trends of the various decades: the neorealism of the forties and into the fifties, human sentiment. Fellini and his introduction of the grotesque and the commentary on things Italian, Antonioni and the themes of culture and alienation? The present film an an example of filmmaking in the seventies? The quality of the interpretation of Italian life by its filmmakers?
4. The point of beginning at the end - the humorous freeze frame and the return to the beginning? Audience curiosity as to what was to happen, the interest and the discovery of the various characters, their fates, successes and failures? A tone of anticipation for the ending? The impact of the end when finally we returned to it? A sense of completion of this particular cycle of three decades of Italian life?
5. The portrait of Italian resistance during the war the tribute to Roberto Rossellini and his films, black and white photography, the bombings, the partisans, the ambushes and the killings? The world of the partisans and their fierce Italian spirit? Their winning the war? Their hopes and their earnestness and idealism at the end of the war facing a new future?
6. How did the film characterize the post-war hopes, the noble ideals, the government, socialism Christian Democrats, finance, economical rebuilding? How did the events tie in with what people hoped for? Disillusion, failing to live up to ideals? Was this inevitable?
7. Nino Manfredi - the genial focus of the film, his work as a partisan, his capacity for friendship, his work at the hospital and its ordinariness and its remaining the same over the years, his fascination with the girl, love for her, the possibility of a happy marriage, his losing her to Gianni. the fight with Gianni? His friendship with the Professor over the years? How well did the film trace his experience with such few differences, his working in the hospital, rapport with people, with the sisters? His disappointments? Growing older and achieving little, same friends, eating in the same place? The encounter with the girl during the filming of La Dolce Vita? How did this illustrate what had happened and not happened to him? The discovery of her ten years later down on her luck? The irony of the revelation to the audience and to Gianni that he had married her? That he had settled down to family life and so had she? The children. the schooling? The portrait of the plain simple ordinary man? A sympathetic portrait of him?
8. The Professor, his appearance, learning, friendship? His marriage and his children and yet his leaving them? His fascination with films - his lack of realism and awareness of what was going on? His work with the film magazine? The pathos of his leaving his family and his town? people's hostility towards him? Life in the city, the encounter with the girl and the nights with her? the comparison of this relationship with that with Kino and with Gianni? His eking out a living in the city? The importance of the quiz and his loquacity, the build-up with his family and the town proud of him, his only getting the car? his mistake and the later interview with De Sica and his justifying his answer? The comedy and drama of the television quiz an an indication of the temper and mood of the Italians? His lack of achievement after this, his failure In life? Or not? The bonds between himself and Manfredi, the friendship with Gianni, the ending?
9. The contrast with Giovanni? His hopes at the end of the war, his social concern, his skill, in law, the encounter with the girl and infatuation, the bond between the two and his taking her away? His going to the interview and its importance for his future life, leaving her at the gate, driving past her? The effect of the fight between them and her leaving? His observing her suicide attempt but not making himself known? His attitude towards the wealthy builder, hostility? The daughter and her giggling curiosity? Yet his infatuation with this world, his marrying the girl and having a family, his building up his position in the firm, saving the legal face of his father-in-law? The passing of the years and the wealth, the opening up of new buildings, society meals and dedication of building, the establishment with government, finance and the Church? His growing older, away from his wife the teenagers and their disregard of their parents? The gradually taking over and his hostility towards his father-in-law, their fights? His longing for his past friends and the sudden encounter, his going anonymously to the reunion oven though he had intended not top his discovery of the truth about the girl, of his friends? His leaving them and inability to stay with them?
10. The importance of the device taken from Eugene O'Neill's "Strange 1nterlude"? The way that it was presented on the stage? The girl's delight with its the mystery to Manfredi? The way that it was used by the director? to what effect, as revealing the inner mind of the characters? The humour of it, yet the revelation of what each was thinking, in relationship to the other especially an regards love for the girl?
11. The girl in herself, in Rome after the war, her way of life, hopes making friends with the men, her affairs, her capacity for love, being hurt by Gianni? The melodrama of the attempted suicide and her rescue? Her drifting over the years? Her reappearances at the filming of La Dolce Vita and the possibility of the future? Her going downhill during the sixties, the reencounter with Manfredi and the marriage and her being satisfied to line up booking the children in for the school? Her participating with the men in the discovery of Gianni’s identity at the end?
12. The portrait of the rich Italian family, the nature of their wealth, attitude towards the law, arrogance, deals, building, the establishment? Their fights and the aggressiveness of the father-in-law?
13. Gianni’s wife as a daughter in this family, her giggling, awkwardness, lack of intelligence, consciousness of her birth? Her simplicity and her delight in marrying Gianni? Her staying with him over the years, gradually becoming more beautiful, more intelligent? The scenes of her loneliness and alienation in the Antonioni style? The importance of her making up stories in her imagination, telling them to Gianni for his attention? Her knowledge, vocabulary and reading? Its futility and her death? Her pain and suffering at her death? The significance of the fantasy sequence in the junk yard of cars and her sitting in it, her accusing Gianni and his deciding not to listen to her? A credible portrait of a woman who changed in her life but could not be sustained in the change?
14. The social attitudes of the times, the political attitudes and tensions of the late forties, Socialists. the Christian Democrats? Elections and campaigns? The Church, wealth? The political status of Italy in the seventies with the retrospect of the post-war decades?
15. Themes of success and failure? By what criteria are they judged?
16. The La Dolce Vita sequence and the participation of Fellini and Marcello Mastroianni? How interesting in itself, entertaining, as a reflection of the times? The interview with De Sica and his comments on Bicycle Thieves?
17. The quality of feeling in the film, charm, emotion, understanding of human nature and frailty and hopes? The puzzle of the ending and our being left with this?
