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The Eroticist
The Vatican described
as a mafia gang solidifying enemies. The future President of the
Italian Republic is a sex maniac expert with dead hands. Very
experienced.
Probably even in our days such a film would 'disdain' someone, but here
we are in 1972 and open heavens. Lucio Fulci pulls a fast one with
'All'onorevole piacciono le donne' (The Honourable Man Likes Women),
which should be put before 'Nonostante le apparenze... e purché
la nazione non lo sappia' (Despite Appearances... and as long as the
nation doesn't know it), which was later deleted by the censors. And it
is precisely the corrosive satire and its consequences that makes this
film into history. Because everything else, it must be said, the story
that is, despite some happy intuitions of the director, does not take
off. It remains a long and, at times, dull comedy.
Fulci does, however, at times create surreal moments that have the
intensity and force of his best horror moments but in the service of
comedy. Above all, he relies on a cast put in the right place. From
Lando Buzzanca, the 'homo eroticus' of Italian cinema, to a beautiful
and talented Laura Antonelli who, like the equally beautiful and
talented Agostina Belli, plays a nun, very interested in carnal sins.
So there is something to save, and that something is Fulci when he does
Fulci. But all together it is unconvincing, and perhaps it is crushed
by the facts of the news and the hard blow delivered to the rigid grey
suits of the First Republic, where sins, manias, had to remain secret.
Lando Buzzanca is Senator Giacinto Puppis, from a left-wing current of
a centre party. Clearly the Christian Democrats. And if that is not
enough, his physical appearance, even if Fulci spoke of a coincidence,
is similar to that of Emilio Colombo, then Prime Minister, who in the
2000s was involved in a drug ring and, according to the vox populi,
also in the Elisa Claps case.
Puppis is running for the post of President of the Italian Republic.
And we find him during the counting of votes. He is playing with a
certain Torsello, his party mate, and for an unintentional horror
effect, with a certain Salvini. But apart from this last truly
terrifying aspect, Puppis has a vice: he extends his hands over other
people's asses. Those of women. An irrepressible vice.
He is filmed, blackmailed and a priest friend of his convinces him to
go to a convent for 'Spiritual Reflection'. But in there he does his
best to get rid of the nuns, who like it, sparing only Sister Delicata
(Laura Antonelli). He returns to politics but realises that he is not
cured, on the contrary. He yields to the (extraordinary) graces of
Sister Delicata and thinks of retiring from political life. But an
archbishop, who is more a mafioso than a priest (Lionel Stender)
convinces him to continue. And he makes all traces of past distractions
disappear.
"My phone began to malfunction. Strange little men, with SIP badges,
but without the I, would come to 'fix' it. Under the house, every day,
there was always a gentleman in a 500 quietly reading the newspaper.
Even one of my daughters, who were very young at the time, noticed that
the newspaper was always from the same day'. This is what Fulci said
when the case broke out. And not only that: the copy sent to the
censorship committee disappeared, then reappeared and was officially
rejected by another committee. Colombo complained to his party
colleagues, who, however, it is said, had a great time seeing the film
in a private screening. And after various other vicissitudes, producer
Amati accepted the cuts and the film was released in March 1972.
Colombo, however, was no longer Prime Minister. The film was a great
success, especially abroad.