Mussolini's early life provides the grist for a major examination of the dictator in Marco Bellocchio's tough-edged but brilliantly directed film. With decades of cinematic experience behind him, as well as a filmography that includes some of the most important post-war Italian films ever made, Bellocchio is well prepared for this challenge. Vincere stands as a model for anyone setting out to capture the flavour and essence of a famed historical figure.
Choosing to focus on Mussolini as a young man, before he became Il Duce, allows Bellocchio to grapple with some little-known details about the dictator's life, indeed the great secret of his past: early on, he had a wife and a son, both written out of the historical record and denied recognition. She was the fiery, erotic Ida Dalser, a woman Mussolini met in 1907 when he was a young socialist provocateur. Seven years later, they became lovers, and her overwhelming passion for the young journalist helped him start his own newspaper, Il Popolo d'Italia. She sold her possessions to provide the financing for the paper, thereby launching the career of the aspiring politician. In 1915, she bore him a son, also named Benito, and the couple married. But within a very short time, she discovered to her shock that her husband had married another woman, Rachele Guidi. Henceforth, Ida was kept at a distance, eventually held under house arrest and finally thrown into an insane asylum, where she petitioned Mussolini and the pope, demanding that her marriage be recognized.
Bellocchio superbly dramatizes this story while skilfully weaving astounding archival footage into his narrative, moving from the intimate, hot-blooded relationship between Ida and Mussolini to the stirring newsreels of the period as their relationship disintegrates. The film has been a revelation for Italians, not only confronting them with the image of the Duce – seen strutting in full-screen bravado – but also provoking comparisons, vigorously denied by Bellocchio, between Mussolini and Italy's current prime minister, Berlusconi. Even if inadvertent, this juxtaposition gives one pause for thought, but Bellocchio is far from a sensationalist grabbing the moment. This is serious, intelligent filmmaking of the highest order.
Piers Handling
Marco Bellocchio was born in Piacenza, Italy, and directed his first film,
Fists in the Pocket, in 1965. His subsequent features include
Leap into the Void (80),
Henry IV (84),
The Butterfly's Dream (94),
The Prince of Homburg (97),
The Nanny (98),
The Religion Hour (02) and
The Wedding Director (07).
Vincere (09) is his most recent film.