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Marriage Italian Style

Marriage Italian Style
Marriage Italian Style.jpg
US re-release film poster
Directed by Vittorio De Sica
Produced by Carlo Ponti
Screenplay by Renato Castellani
Tonino Guerra
Leo Benvenuti
Piero De Bernardi
Based on Filumena Marturano
by Eduardo De Filippo
Starring Sophia Loren
Marcello Mastroianni
Aldo Puglisi
Tecla Scarano
Marilu' Tolo
Music by Armando Trovajoli
Cinematography Roberto Gerardi
Edited by Adriana Novelli
Production
company
Compagnia Cinematografica Champion
Les Films Concordia
Distributed by Interfilm (Italy)
Embassy Pictures (US)
Release date
  • 1964 (1964)
Running time
102 minutes
Country Italy
France
Language Italian
Box office $4.1 million (US/Canada) (rentals)

Marriage Italian Style (Italian: Matrimonio all'italiana [matriˈmɔːnjo allitaˈljaːna]) is a 1964 film by Vittorio De Sica.

It tells the World War II era story of a cynical, successful businessman named Domenico (Mastroianni), who, after meeting a naive country girl, Filumena (Loren), one night in a Neapolitan brothel, keeps frequenting her for years in an on-off relationship (as she continues working as a prostitute). He eventually takes her in his house as a semi-official mistress under the pretense that she take care of his ailing, senile mother. After having fallen for a younger, prettier girl and having planned to marry her, he finds himself cornered when Filumena feigns illness and "on her deathbed", asks to be married to him. Thinking she'll be dead in a matter of hours and that the 'marriage' won't even be registered, he agrees. After having been proclaimed his legal bride, the shrewd and resourceful Filumena drops the charade and reveals to have put up the show for the one child she bore from him (she gave birth to three sons but Domenico only maintained to have fathered one). Domenico tries to cajole her into telling him which one is his but she stalwartly refuses, telling him that sons can't be picked and chosen and that he has to be the father of all three. It stars Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni and Vito Moricone.

One of the film's most memorable moments is when Domenico is on the phone with his new flame, shortly after having married the "moribund" Filumena. As he reassures his fiancée that death is near, a wild-eyed and vengeful Filumena emerges from a curtain behind him and exclaims in Neapolitan that she is in fact alive and well—the Madonna having taken pity on her.

The film was adapted by Leonardo Benvenuti, Renato Castellani, Piero De Bernardi and Tonino Guerra from the play Filumena Marturano by Eduardo De Filippo. It was directed by Vittorio De Sica.


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