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Bookmark this pageHouse of Smiles (1990)
Director: Marco Ferreri
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Ferreri's film concerns old age (the old provocateur is in his sixties himself), and centres around the relationship between two 'inmates' of a home for the elderly: lively, eccentric Adelina (Thulin) and dapper charmer Andrea (Ruspoli). All Ferreri's films have elements of surreal black farce, and here the farce resides in the outrageous institutional repressiveness of the home and its staff. Ferreri turns everything on its head. Transgressors (and those unable any longer to perform basic functions for themselves) are threatened with dispatch to 'Africa', an outbuilding staffed by immigrant Maghrebi workers. It is there that the celebrant couple go for privacy and sex (in the Watermelon caravan belonging to their African friends). A film of sharp insight, filled with humanity and mischievous subversiveness.Author: WH
Cast & crew
Director: Marco Ferreri
Producer: Giovanna Romagnoli, Augusto Caminito
Cast: Ingrid Thulin, Dado Ruspoli, Vincenzo Cannavale, Maria Mercader, Elisabeth Kaza full cast
Duration: 100 mins
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