牙签乔尼

不知不觉黑眼圈的放映进程已经过半，今天为我们带来的是第十部影片《牙签乔尼》。贝尼尼是意大利喜剧电影的瑰宝级演员、导演《美丽人生》是他的巅峰之作，布拉斯基是她的妻子，御用女主，在本片中也不例外的担当女主角。 影片乏善可陈，剧本套路化，贝尼尼的表演依然在线，但也并无惊艳之处。把一个舞台剧中小丑的表演搬到电影中而没有发掘更深层次的关于生活和人性的思考，注定不会有更大的突破。不过很多细节的趣味性还是有的，例如贝尼尼装残疾骗保险时的手的表演就很有趣。 不知道为什么，个人感觉好的喜剧总会带有一点悲剧的底色才好，纯粹的荒诞喜剧总显得刺激有余，回味不足。 就像中国的相声，虽然说、学、逗、唱从技法上各有千秋，帅、买、怪、坏从表演上各具特色，然而让我们真正不断回味的确是那些表演中创造出来的小人物的底色。相声或者说喜剧一旦变成了一本正经的说教或者是撒泼式的表演就陡然变得意趣全无了。 喜剧不好做，好喜剧更难。

After Dante (Benigni), an ordinary school bus driver returning from his extraordinary adventure in Palermo, his takeaway is that people there is dead serious about lawfulness, as he can personally vouch that filching a banana can incite vehement public censure. The joke is broad but also smart and trenchant levering at the Mafia-ridden Sicily region. In Benigni’s JOHNNY STECCHINO, the snow job is never debunked for a simpleton like Dante, and as a comedy filmmaker, Benigni’s brilliant acumen is to tap into audience’s explicit knowingness and elicit ample lulz at the expense of our protagonist’s bewilderedness. Au fond, JOHNNY STECCHINO (“stecchino” means toothpick) is a ringer comedy, Dante is chosen by the gracious Maria (Braschi) for his uncanny resemblance of the latter’s criminal husband, the titular Johnny (also played by Benigni for sure, putting on a straight face and ramping up the volumes of obnoxiousness), who is a murderer and fink in hiding, wanted by the local mafia boss Cozzamara (Pappalardo). The couple’s masterplan is to ensure everyone that Dante is Johnny, so after Dante is rubbed out by Cozzamara, they can start life anew in somewhere else. While Dante is too gormless to deliver him from the jeopardy he is unwittingly enmeshed into, the game changer falls upon Maria, as per usual, Braschi, Ms. Benigni, is put on a pedestal as a sensuous, but way-out-of-the-league woman here, Maria’s change-of-heart is brought off with a more schematic but subtle inflection. Moreover, Braschi’s self-possessed demeanor and sometimes kooky behavior together efficaciously counterpoises Benigni’s buffoonish effusion and self-effacing alacrity, they create a more coruscating chemistry here than in their other collaborations, the consummate LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL (1997) included. Among the supporting cast, making a big splash is Bonacelli’s goofy, cocaine-tooting lawyer, having a ball with pertinent comedic bent, even when he unwisely invites hostages to fortune. As a massively popular Italian comedy, its appeal is universal and disarming. It can be bawdy, certain plot devices are ill-sorted (the disability-feigning gimmick is stiltedly thrown into the third act, for example), and it leaves a faintly bitter taste when it ends with an insensitive jest on a Down’s syndrome kid. But Benigni is down-to-earth and innocuous enough to get away with that demerit, for most of its time, JOHNNY STECCHINO doesn’t let hubris and vulgar get into its merrymaking head. referential entries: Benigni’s THE MONSTER (1994, 6.8/10), LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL (1997, 8.4/10).