MEDITERRANEO
A film review by Sri Rajeev
Copyright 1992 Sri Rajeev
MEDITERRANEO is one of those small, surprising and delightful films - such as the French used to make at one time - that leave a smile on your face without taxing you overly. I hate to denigrate it by calling it a perfect summer movie, but that really is what it is: good, clean entertainment. By the way, it did win an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, I think in 1991.
The film is in Italian, set on a small Greek island in the Mediterranean. The island is of dubious strategic value, and to the small troupe of Second World War Italian soldiers (self-described by the schoolmaster Lieutenant as a bunch of misfits) sent to capture and hold the island, it appears to be an exercise in futility. The island seems completely devoid of human habitation, and since they are pretty much incommunicado (their transport ship having been shot up and destroyed by the enemy, and their radio broken by one of the soldiers in a fit of pique), they seem to have a time of total boredom ahead of them. But all of a sudden (and the viewer becomes a willing believer in this convenient fiction), the inhabitants of the village reappear. It turns out they had hidden themselves in the caves because their previous experience with occupying soldiers (German as it happens) had been none too nice - the Germans had taken away all the able-bodied men.
Then follows a very pleasant time for the soldiers: they are accepted by the Greeks as comrades (for some reason they all keep saying, "One race, one face" - although eventually someone does counter with "One race, one stomach" after a particularly large meal.) They lead a blissful, Lotos-Eater existence for several years. The Lieutenant, an amateur artist, is commissioned to repaint the murals in the church; various of the men find agreeable female companionship.
Eventually, of course, all this good stuff must come to an end, and reality strikes in the personages of two rather pompous British naval ensigns who appear to take the Italians home in the aftermath of the war. They are suitably nonplussed by the scruffy Italian soldiers who have gone native, complete with baggy trousers and vests.
All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable film; even the (obligatory?) Turkish villain and the starchy Brits were treated with good humor. The blue-green Mediterranean and the dazzlingly whitewashed Greek village make one long to take a trip!
(Probably rated R for nudity, adult situations)
-- Sri Rajeev, Marketing Manager, Display Products MTV 15-46, Sun Microsystems, 2550 Garcia Ave, Mt. View, CA 94043 (415)-336-1101 rajeev@travancore.eng.sun.com
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