Benigni (assisted by Arbore) as “The Local Critic” – Corriere.it

The Rai film initiative to broadcast some clips before the evening film screeningsomeone else To celebrate the 70th anniversary of Roberto Benigni’s life. These are the ones in which the then Tuscan comedian, in the 1978-1979 season, performed an unprecedented role as a film critic. Researched by Renzo Arbor in good condition, Benigni talks about the films he has seen. Not an aesthetic, moral or philosophical reflection, but contradictory and astounding personal judgments. In the absence of a “general theory of literature review”, the local critic (the recordings in the Arbor house) spelled obscure, affectionate, poisonous, obnoxious words, as if he had not seen the work he was talking about, such as if he did not know what he was talking about.

Unconsciously, or maybe not, Arbor and Benigni They launched that critical stance that Franco Fortini called “inventive criticism”: “The critic becomes one Synthetic materialHe is the Creator who overlaps with others until he takes on his colors.” The film became a simple excuse to improvise the digressions, to tell personal obsessions, to expose the cialtroneria (with all possible affection). After Benigni, it may be said, with Giorgio Manganelli, that there is nothing more absurd than revision; A miserable, irresponsible gesture, a snapshot of a chat, a bunch of useless adjectives, frivolous circumstances, funny sentences. That is why, spurred on by the brilliant performance of the critic and his brilliant interlocutor, we will never allow ourselves to say, as some do, that this is the best of Benigni, who has not yet been entrapped by the ambiguous, and perhaps rhetorical, intellectuals of Benny. The song “Pantheon” when echoed by Enzo Ungari, Marco Melani and sometimes also Bernardo Bertolucci. In the meantime, let’s enjoy these cash festivities drill.