''My Brother Is an Only Child'' ( it, Mio fratello è figlio unico) is a 2007 Italian drama film directed by
Daniele Luchetti
Daniele Luchetti (; born 25 July 1960) is an Italian film director, screenwriter and actor.
Life and career
Luchetti was born in Rome. He debuted as assistant director for Nanni Moretti in '' Bianca'' (1983) and '' The Mass Is Ended'' (1985) ...
. It is based on an
Antonio Pennacchi novel. The title comes from a song by
Rino Gaetano
Salvatore Antonio "Rino" Gaetano (29 October 1950 – 2 June 1981) was an Italian musician and singer-songwriter. He is famous for his satirical songs and oblique yet incisive political commentary. He is remembered for his raspy voice, for the he ...
from 1976.
Plot
Accio (
Elio Germano
Elio Germano (born 25 September 1980) is an Italian actor. He is the recipient of many accolades, including a Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor and a Silver Bear for Best Actor.
Life and career
Born in Rome to a Molisan family from Duro ...
) and Manrico (
Riccardo Scamarcio
Riccardo Dario Scamarcio (; born 13 November 1979) is an Italian actor and film producer.
Life and career
Scamarcio was born in Trani, Apulia, the son of Irene Petrafesa, a painter, and Emilio Scamarcio.
He went to train as an actor at the Sc ...
) are working class brothers who live in Italy in the 1960s. While his brother becomes drawn into left-wing politics, Accio, the hotheaded younger brother, is taken under the wing of a market trader and while under his influence, joins the
Fascist
Fascism is a far-right, Authoritarianism, authoritarian, ultranationalism, ultra-nationalist political Political ideology, ideology and Political movement, movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and pol ...
party. Accio ("Bully") is a nickname he is proud of because it makes him seem tough. Manrico and their sister Violetta are alarmed to hear their brother listening to
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in 194 ...
's speeches in his room. Manrico often physically torments his brother, including stuffing his head in the barrel under the drain pipe of their house.
Accio once runs away from home because his mother voted for the Houses Party. Their house is falling apart and she thinks the Houses Party will help them rebuild it.
As Accio and Manrico get older they start demonstrating as members of the Fascist party and the Communist movement respectively. (There are scenes of a
factory occupation, and the occupation of the Rome conservatoire, where the sister is studying the cello.) The film is relatively even handed in its treatment of politics. If the young fascists seem absurd with their chanting of 'Duce! Duce!', and their actions constantly tending to violence, the communists are hardly less so: Schiller's words in the final movement of Beethoven's choral symphony are replaced by a hymn in praise of
Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong pronounced ; also romanised traditionally as Mao Tse-tung. (26 December 1893 – 9 September 1976), also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary who was the founder of the People's Republic of China (PRC) ...
,
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 19 ...
and
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...
; a meeting of activists consists of a room full of bearded men all shouting at once and only agreeing when the time comes to shout a slogan.
Francesca, Manrico's girlfriend, becomes Accio's friend. Accio secretly likes her and thinks that she should not stay with Manrico because "he can't be depended on". The viewer is in little doubt that Accio is also attracted to Francesca himself. At the same time, he has himself become sexually involved with the wife of his fascist friend, the market trader, who has been imprisoned for his violent political activities. She buys him a car through an installment plan.
Eventually Accio ends up leaving the Fascist party and tearing up his membership card when party members burn his brother's car. He also breaks up with his older lover, telling her that he cares for someone else, but not replying when asked if he is loved in return.
But while Accio largely pulls out of political activism, his brother is drawn deeper into revolutionary violence. After disappearing for two years, he calls home. Accio travels to meet him and telephones Francesca, who twice quickly hangs up on him. When they meet in a cafe, Manrico sees Francesca arriving unexpectedly, but also the police who have perhaps been tailing her or tapping her telephone. He flees but dies in an exchange of (handgun) fire with the pursuing police.
Accio then breaks into the corrupt and inefficient housing office to seize the waiting keys and the records of the homeless. He distributes keys and a party of homeless families take possession in the middle of the same night. The film ends with Accio living with his family, including his brother's small son.
Cast
*
Elio Germano
Elio Germano (born 25 September 1980) is an Italian actor. He is the recipient of many accolades, including a Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actor and a Silver Bear for Best Actor.
Life and career
Born in Rome to a Molisan family from Duro ...
as Accio Benassi
*
Riccardo Scamarcio
Riccardo Dario Scamarcio (; born 13 November 1979) is an Italian actor and film producer.
Life and career
Scamarcio was born in Trani, Apulia, the son of Irene Petrafesa, a painter, and Emilio Scamarcio.
He went to train as an actor at the Sc ...
as Manrico Benassi
*
Angela Finocchiaro
Angela Finocchiaro (born 20 November 1955, in Milan) is an Italian actress.
She won the David di Donatello for Best Supporting Actress in 2006 for her performance in ''The Beast in the Heart'' and in 2007 for her role of Amelia Benassi in '' ...
as Amelia Benassi
*
Massimo Popolizio
Massimo Popolizio (born 4 July 1961) is an Italian actor and voice actor.
Biography
Massimo Popolizio studied at the Silvio D'Amico National Academy of Dramatic Arts in Rome in 1984, Popolizio started his career as a stage actor and, after gradu ...
as Ettore Benassi
* Ascanio Celestini as Padre Cavalli
*
Diane Fleri
Diane Fleri (born 13 July 1983), is a French-born Italian actress.
Early life
Fleri was born in Quimper, Brittany, France, to an Italian father, Marino Fleri, a diplomat of Estonian and Maltese origins, and a French mother of Vietnamese origin ...
as Francesca
*
Alba Rohrwacher
Alba Caterina Rohrwacher (, ; born 27 February 1979) is an Italian actress.
Early life
Alba Rohrwacher was born in Florence, the daughter of a German father and an Italian mother.
From the age of 17 to 21 she studied medicine, intending to be a ...
as Violetta Benassi
*
Vittorio Emanuele Propizio as Young Accio
*
Claudio Botosso
Claudio Botosso (born 28 March 1958) is an Italian actor. He appeared in more than forty films since 1985.
Selected filmography
References
External links
*
1958 births
Living people
Italian male film actors
{{Italy-film-actor ...
as Prof. Montagna
*
Ninni Bruschetta
Ninni Bruschetta (born Antonino Bruschetta on 6 January 1962) is an Italian actor, film and stage director and screenwriter.
Life and career
Born in Messina, in 1983 Bruschetta co-founded with Maurizio Puglisi "Nutrimenti terrestri", a stag ...
as Segretario Bombacci
*
Anna Bonaiuto
Anna Bonaiuto (born 28 January 1950) is an Italian actress. She has appeared in 48 films and television shows since 1973. She starred in '' L'amore molesto'', which was entered into the 1995 Cannes Film Festival.
Selected filmography
Referen ...
as Bella Nastri
*
Luca Zingaretti
Luca Zingaretti (; born 11 November 1961) is an Italian actor and film director, known for playing Salvo Montalbano in the '' Inspector Montalbano'' mystery series based on the character and novels created by Andrea Camilleri. Zingaretti is a na ...
as Mario Nastri
* Pasquale Sammarco as Padre Tosi
* Lorenzo Pagani as Bertini
* Matteo Sacchi as Ragazzo Biliardino
Reception
The film received positive reviews from critics. The review aggregator
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
reported that 86% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 63 reviews with an average rating of 7/10.
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
reported the film had an average score of 71 out of 100, based on 19 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Awards
The film won four
David di Donatello Awards—Best Actor (Elio Germano), Best Supporting Actress (Angela Finocchiaro), Best Screenplay, Best Editing.
References
External links
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{{Daniele Luchetti
2007 films
2007 drama films
Films set in the 1960s
2000s Italian-language films
Films directed by Daniele Luchetti
Films set in Lazio
Italian drama films