L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, MAY 14, 2015 www.italoamericano.org L'Italo-Americano 17 La Mortadella, symbol of the Italian culture traveling to US in Monicelli's classic film As any Italian living in US and traveling back and forth would know, there is always the question on what can and can't be brought back to the States in terms of food. There's always that dairy product, that delicious cheese or mouth-watering cured meat that we would like to bring back with us. Then the question arises if cus toms w ill allow it. O n a recent trip I couldn't help pictu- ring S ophia Loren in M ario M onicelli's 1971 film, L a Mortadella. It is one of the lesser known films of the Maestro, yet extremely funny and still poi- gnant to this day. Loren plays Maddalena Ciarrapico, a young woman arriving at JFK Airport in New York to meet up with her husband to be, another Italian, played by Gigi Proietti. The man built a new life in the States, after leaving his wife a few years prior because of his affair with Maddalena. In the small town of Carpi, where they were from, the adul- tery was looked down on, their young love was deemed a disgra- ce, divorce was still illegal. Their only choice was to go to the land of the free. Once at the airport Maddalena gets immediately stopped and refused entrance because of a giant mortadella she is carrying in her arms. She's pure-hearted and s he can't understand how such delicacy can be seen as a threat to a coun- try. The law must be wrong and should be changed. She was tau- ght by her man to speak out against perceived injustice and the thought alone that the pre- cious pork meat should be dispo- s ed of is incomprehens ible. Officers explain there is still fear of the 1967 swine fever to which she candidly replies "Our pigs are healthy, they never even had a cold." The mortadella becomes a proxy for freedom; freedom that is being denied in w hat should be a free country. In fact for the American market the movie w as renamed L ady Liberty. Stuck at the airport, the woman becomes a national inci- dent to be dealt with. High rank security comes to reason with her because all are equal before the law and mus t abide, no exceptions; the city councilman of Italian descent comes to her defense, seeing it as an opportu- nity for publicity for the upco- ming elections; her fiancée final- ly shows his true colors, revea- ling of having traded his inte- grity and the revolutionary spirit he had back home for capitalism and conformism; a down-on-his- luck reporter seizes the moment to finally make the front page. Suddenly it is a media circus. Although the law has since changed in regards of processed meat, traveling and going throu- gh customs has only become more complicated over the years for reasons well known to all. It is still a good rule of thumb not to bring anything fresh or meat derivative. The movie, which was shot almost entirely in the city of New York, symbol of the American Dream, uses comedy to bring the attention to rules and regulations, culture differences, close minded enforcers, and often lack of good judgment. It is a caustic caricature of both sides, bringing up the absurdity of certain ways of life. The line spoken by the reporter about building credit, "They give you credit only if you can prove you don't need it," is a clear example of that. On the other hand the Italian way of being ready to question the authority at every turn is clearly open to criticism, depending on the point of view. Finally the absurdity in blind enforcement of the law is perfec- tly captured in the solution that solves the matter: once the air- port personnel get their hands on the mortadella, they eat it with gusto. The cas t features future movie stars with young, fresh faces in smaller roles: Danny De Vito plays the congressman, Willian Devane (who would be S ecretary of D efens e on the series 24) plays the Daily News reporter and Susan Sarandon plays his ex-wife. It's definitely worth revisiting the movie throu- gh today's eyes for its satirical take on society. MICHAEL TRAVERSA Director Mario Monicelli while shooting a movie La Mortadella is one of the lesser movies of the Maestro, yet extremely funny and still poignant to this day The original movie poster of the movie with Sophia Loren and Gigi Proietti

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