Marco Ferreri
Break Up

From Wikipedia

Balloon: “a latex container that can be inflated by mouth or with the help of hand pumps, electric pumps, or by using helium tanks.

Those inflated with helium fly, those inflated with air do not.”

When does a balloon burst? When do we understand that the breath we're about to give will be the last that the latex walls can contain?

And if we reduced the intensity of the breaths maybe it would resist a little longer... we’d need a German, a German engineer... he would know the answer.

Mario can't sleep at night, he who is a successful industrialist from Milan, he who is about to marry a beautiful woman and lives in a last-cry stylish apartment with a view of the cathedral is self-destructing because he has a goal... to determine the breaking point of a balloon.

Because the matter is serious, he has to solve the problem or it’s the end for him, his life would no longer have meaning, he would no longer be worthy of holding a prominent place in this society and he would deserve to end up with those people he despises so much, workers, housewives, and cleaning ladies.

Giovanna, his future bride, is perfect, she is cute and fashionable and they even make love (but discreetly… the wife's honor is fundamental, after all she is not marrying any fool) but she is still young and too inexperienced to be able to support him and then let’s face it, she must do her part... the model bride to display in the showcase because the world that counts is a world of men.

Alpha male of good looks, full of money, and fundamentally dazed, what does he do? He can only dedicate himself to his latex balloons and he is not willing to compromise, he will find a solution for better or for worse.

Masterfully interpreted by the national Marcello and directed by an inspired Ferreri, this film to me is a small (almost) hidden gem, an hour and twenty minutes of pure Ferreri, a deadly nonsensical concentrate in its economy, in its low-budget black and white with a few drops of color here and there and a very particular soundtrack producing serial noises that recall the protagonist's obsessions.

The story of the film is quite particular: reduced to about 30 minutes by producer Carlo Ponti in 1965 and distributed as the first episode in the triptych of “Oggi, domani dopodomani”, it was released in France with the current title in 1969 before being distributed also in Italy in what is the definitive version with the addition of some color scenes.

In this very timely work and unfortunately even more in this moment of quarantine, Ferreri seems to assert that the perfectly integrated individual in the capitalist society is a perfect idiot and that if the "toy" is taken away, they reveal themselves for what they are, a perfect fool. Despite the serious intent, the film is hilarious because it has that lightness typical of the Milanese master who is as always exceptional in depicting the banal, petty, and senseless everyday life of the bourgeois prototype.

Mastroianni is exceptional in giving importance to small gestures with that sly manner that is a true trademark and if I may say, more at ease in Break Up than in La Grande Abbuffata, where Tognazzi, Piccoli, and Noiret were superior... what can I say... highly recommended viewing for this rough diamond that awaits a good polish!