Saturday, January 28, 2012

Riso Amaro

TCM showed some great Italian neo-realism films a while back. I PVRd Riso Amaro (1949), which translates as "Bitter Rice" or... "Bitter Laughter". It has been on my must-see list for a while. What a cast... Silvana Mangano, Vittorio Gassman and Raf "rowrrrrrrrrrrrr" Vallone. Itinerant rice-harvesters in the Po Valley struggle with poverty and an uncertain future while being swept up into love, lust, crime and jealousy. It certainly lived up to expectation. And yes, there was a lot of rice.

Neo-realistic? Oh yes, very. Down to the sultry Silvana's un-molested underarms. What's all the fuss about armpit hair? I don't get it. I mean look at Silvana... do you notice the hair? Do you care?

2 comments:

will said...

Bitter Rice is one of several films on my must-see list.

Regarding armpit hair ... basically its cultural and I'm certain you could find websites dedicated to hairy pits. (I haven't looked.)

G said...

I'm sure you're right, Bill!