re:mote voices

Title: Malèna
Cast: Monica Bellucci, Giuseppe Sulfaro, Luciano Federico, Matilde Piana
Director: Giuseppe Tornatore

malena is the story of a woman called malena in a small italian town during the second world. as witnessed by a 12 year old boy, who puts her on a pedestal, because she is his first realisation of sexuality. malena is not originally from this town and hence is always an outsider. with the outbreak of war, and the departure of her husband the gossip starts. malena, played by monica belucci, is regarded as being beautiful, and the assumption is that as soon as her husband is away she will sleep around. this creates an environment where as soon as she steps out of the house all the men are leering at her, coming on to her, chancing their arm. while all the women look on at this attention with disgust, and sully her name. the effect of this worsens as the war goes on, malena's reputation going down hill all the time, regardless of whether there is any truth in the matter. to the point where if she wants to eat and survive here then she is going to have to some compromise - which means that malena is forced into a downward spiral, one with landmarks of personal tragedy. for the most part malena is about how cruel and wrong people can be, the treatment this one woman receives becoming progressively worse, so that in the end it is pretty disgusting. the other main theme is the sexual awakening of the boy, how he follows malena about and sees that she isn't what people say she is, but also he stands and listens while they talk behind her back. he struggles to cope with her problems, but ultimately he is our witness.