Come Home and Meet My Wife (1974)

Far from Perfect, Far from Terrible

An action-packed slog

I gave this film a 9 out of 10, because it was exactly what I expected it to be.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

I had enjoyed Mario Monicelli's BIG DEAL ON MADONNA STREET (1958) and THE GREAT WAR (1959) immensely. ROMANZO POPOLARE (or come and meet my wife) is not in the same league as those two classics.An ageing factory worker (ugo tognazzi) seduces his teenage goddaughter (the gorgeous and sizzling ornela mutti) and marries her. the film begins medias res with the two of them already married. They live in a working class tenement. Ugo is an active communist and when one of his comrades injures a young handsome policeman during a demonstration, Ugo does the decent thing and invites him over for cards. The policeman moves in on the feisty Mutti when Ugo is away to attend a funeral.The film is a comedy that never really takes off. It depends too much on the two main actors - both Ugo and Mutti are fantastic. Mutti was such a hot young woman. She plays working class italian women really well. She is as intense and convincing as she was in Damiano Damiani's THE MOST BEAUTIFUL WIFE. But there isn't much in the script. There are'nt too many memorable scenes, I watched the whole thing only because of the two charming leads. And despite it being a sex comedy, I was given only a few glimpses of Mutti's nude body.I enjoyed some of the gimmicks like the freeze frames where the characters pause to reflect on their life situation. The film does capture a changing society that allows more freedom, choice and social mobility for women. Mutti's character rejects both her husband and her boyfriend in the end to work and support her kid on her own. It celebrates female sexuality in a way that might offend feminists of today - the handsome policeman kisses, gropes and jumps on Mutti many times before she makes love to him (after protesting first). There is even a song that goes "I'm a woman, not a saint."The rambunctious pippo starnazza who plays ugo's neighbor and comrade was quite amusing. The poppy background score was quite catchy.(6/10

One of the big problems with 1970's Italian comedies is that they are either available only in Italian and thus difficult to understand if you're not too fluent in that language, or they are VERY badly dubbed into English which to my mind is much worse. Inept dubbing doesn't necessarily hurt your silliest sex comedies (i.e. the ones featuring the likes of Lino Banfi, Gloria Guida, etc.), but it is death to the ones that are halfway serious like this one. A factory foreman, influential union leader, and all-around working-class hero (who claims to have bedded 3000 women!) decides to get married at the age of 51 to his 17-year-old goddaughter. (This may sound pretty perverse, but since she is played by Ornella Muti I'm sure no one would hold it against him). He believes he has progressive modern attitudes about sex, but these attitudes are severely tested when he starts to suspect his young wife is cheating on him with a handsome military officer (Michele Placido). And he becomes downright crazed when he realizes his suspicions may very well be justified.This is a very Italian movie given that the hero is basically a philandering communist and his wife is about half a traditional Italian working-class woman and about half a modern "free love" 70's chick. Unfortunately, the guy is dubbed with an accent that sounds more like Queens than Italy, and Muti for some reason talks like Scarlet O'Hara! The bad dubbing distracts greatly from any serious gravitas the movie might have or any comment it might be making about modern-day amore all'italia and the relation between the sexes. As a sex comedy, on the other hand, it isn't as funny as some, nor does it seem to aim to be particularly titillating (despite several nice nude scenes by Muti).NoShame or somebody like that might someday release a subtitled version that would no doubt make it much easier to appreciate. But whether this movie is any good or not--well, it's hard to tell when it's dubbed by a bunch of clowns like this.

(Some spoilers) This movie was shown in the United States as "Come Home and Meet My Wife." The version I saw at that time was atrociously dubbed in English with characters from the south of Italy given a "you-all" southern drawl. A video from Italy in the original language proved to be somewhat more satisfying. The movie stars Ugo Tognazzi and Ornella Muti. Tognazzi, aged 51, marries his beautiful 17-year-old goddaughter (Muti) whom he has not seen since her baptism. The story centers around Tognazzi's jealousy when he returns from a trip to find his young wife making out with a young police officer (Michele Placido) whom he had befriended after a violent union dispute. Although he likes to pride himself on his liberal attitudes in sexual matters, as he does in his politics, when he becomes an old-fashioned "cornuto," his reaction is not so tolerant (nor should it be) and he orders the girl out of the house. She goes to stay with the cop. The two men fight over her. She leaves. Years go by. The cop is married to someone else. Tognazzi wants to rekindle the romance with Muti, now a successful fashion designer. The stuff of this film is somehow tired and the story never comes to life. And what might have been a very respectable little domestic comedy turns out to be insistently shrill and uninvolving. Mario Monicelli, director of the famed "Big Deal on Madonna Street," has made much better films and this one struck me at times as a pale imitation of some of the elements of Ettore Scola's "Dramma della gelosia," made a few years earlier.