06/04/2011

Italian comedies are getting more and more topical. Following Massimiliano Bruno’s Nessuno mi può giudicare [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (“No One Can Judge Me”), on a woman who becomes an escort to support her family (enjoying its third week at the top of the box office with €6.5m in takings), another comedy is tackling a theme on everyone’s mind in Italy these days: nepotism/favouritism in the workplace.

Moreover, C'è chi dice no [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (“There Are Those Who Say No”) by Giambattista Avellino is being released Friday, April 8, the day before demonstrations will be held throughout Italy and abroad by temporary and/or contract-less employees [a massive number in Italy]. Perfect timing.

As with Nessuno [+see also:
trailer
film profile], C'è chi dice no [+see also:
trailer
film profile] also features Paola Cortellesi as an esteemed doctor who just as she is about to obtain a much yearned for contract is ousted by her chief’s girlfriend. She stars alongside Luca Argentero, a talented journalist with a short-term contract who’s about to be hired full-time when his boss’s daughter snags his spot. The film’s trio is rounded out by Paolo Ruffini, a criminal law genius whose university position is whipped up by the department dean’s son-in-law.

In other words, favouritism as a plague. So the three protagonists decide to avenge themselves with a weapon essentially equal to what was used against them: stalking, or sabotaging the lives of those who ruined their own, to win back their rightful jobs.

"The most recent [local] comedies have featured men vs. women, brothers who hate one another, overbearing mothers, close friends, and lovers,” said the director. "We, however, want to talk about something different, not a private issue, but one that is shared. Who among us has not been slighted by favouritism?".

The film has no intentions of offering a sweetened or consolatory take on the lack of a meritocracy, in and of itself is a considerable social problem in Italy – "Those who steal merit steal not only jobs, but life” is the film’s battle cry. It instead finds an efficient metaphor: of hooded people dressed in black shadowing the “merit thieves” on the street, as a sort of conscience, who discover that there are many who have gotten jobs through favouritism and that perhaps, ultimately, between string-pulling and even the most innocuous recommendations, everyone has in some way.

The Cattleya production is being distributed on approximately 320 screens by Universal Pictures.

(Translated from Italian)