DVR ALERT FOR SUNDAY NIGHT:

TCM has the all-time great Italian tragi-comedy, "Mafioso" (1962) by Alfredo Lattuada, listed here at 11:15 pm tonite (Pacific Time). I just bought the DVD. Here's a review:

I saw this film when it was released in '62 and never forgot it--a great example of the unique Italian cinematic gift of combining rapier wit, humor, drama and tragedy--and blending them perfectly.
Nino Badalamenti (Alberto Sordi) left Sicily for Milan and now works as a managerial technician in a big auto plant. He married blond, blue-eyed Marta (Norma Bengell) and has two adorable blond, blue-eyed girls. His family and friends in Sicily have never met his wife and kids, so they're spending their two-week vacation in the little town he left years ago. But before he leaves the plant, the boss gives him a package to be delivered to Don Vincenzo (Ugo Attanasio)--the Mafia boss of his town---a hint of things to come.

Once they disembark at Messina, a series of riotous, razor-sharp scenes of Sicilian life ensue--most of them far funnier and on the mark than those in "Divorce, Italian Style." The taxi taking them from the ferry to his parents' home stops while a blacksmith shoes a mule. Behind them, a dead man is laid out on a bed while those around him are drinking and eating. "What are they doing?" asks a horrified Marta. "They're giving him a little party--it's a local custom," Nino replies. He calls out to one of the partiers; "Hey, goombah, how'd he die?" "Due pistoli," he replies stolidly. "MAMA!!" cries Nino as he rushes toward five identically black-clad women at the family home. "I'm not your mama, I'm your Aunt Gina," replies the one of the five he's clasped. It goes on and on like this, one scene funnier than the next.
But after he delivers the "gift" to Don Vincenzo, Nino finds that, while he can take himself out of Sicily, he can't take Sicily out of him. Don Vincenzo and his boys are scouting Nino for a mission. They invite him to go hunting--but the hunt turns out to be in New Jersey, not on a nearby estate, and the prey isn't pheasant or hare. No choice for Nino. That part, too, is brought off ingeniously but credibly, and not without humor, either.

"Mafioso" doesn't quite reach the heights of "Seven Beauties," the all time champ in the Italian tragicomic genre. And Sordi isn't quite the actor that Giancarlo Gianinni is. But it's still a great film.