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Rating: At the time, I was too young and perhaps too naive to understand. At home, the news didn't even reach us. Or rather, it wasn't acknowledged. In a godforsaken town, gradually overshadowed by the suburbs, there was no room for the PCI. I only remember a few dusty holes gathering deserted sections of the MSI and the Liberal Party. It only took moments to erase them forever. What was that "Red Sea" that descended upon the News of the first channel?
A few days earlier, on June 7, 1984 in Padua, at Piazza della Frutta, Compagno Berlinguer was declaiming, yes, declaiming, his last verses. Because Enrico Berlinguer, as the lively Tuscan, who even lifted him up, defined him, was a poet of politics. And he, a distinguished and earnest person, played along, allowing himself to be lifted in the comedian's arms, marking another turning point in the Italian political landscape.
There he was on stage, behind those thick, dark-rimmed glasses, weighed down by something not yet fully perceived. His breathing struggled to escape but his words, despite everything, were clear and intense...and now, comrades, I urge you all to commit yourselves, in these few days that separate us from the vote, with the enthusiasm that communists have always shown at crucial moments. Work all of you, house by house, company by company, street by street, engaging with citizens, with faith in the battles we have fought, in the proposals we present, for what we have been and are... from the audience, with brotherly love, someone notices his condition and urges him to stop. Enough Enrico! Enough! ...it is possible to gain new and broader support for our lists, for our cause, which is the cause of peace, of freedom, of work, of the progress of our civilization...and the curtain fell.
He died four days later. He left us, the man who had made the Italian Communist Party great,the honest man, integral and tenacious, the true politician, prone to error but loyal and decent. The one who, with lively cordiality, told Brezhnev to go to hell and mimicked him despite being involved in a strange car accident. Berlinguer could have been an angel and on that occasion, he could soar, avoiding the twisted metal. The man of the "moral question," of the historic compromise, of righteous politics, of FIAT occupations was gone. The man who, if he had risen to the Government, would surely have made Italy a better country.The most loved one. A Communist. But a True one.
About sixty directors, journalists, actors, among whom it's obligatory to highlightPontecorvo, Maselli, the Bertolucci brothers, Scola, Benigni, Montaldo, Agosti, placed on film the funeral of Compagno Berlinguer, held in Rome on June 13, 1984. Under the shadow of an Adagio overwhelmed by applause, in Piazza San Giovanni, there were over a million people kissing the shroud. Intense and profound were the tears of President Pertini. When he placed his hands on the coffin hoping to feel a hint of warmth. He stared at the coffin, leaned in as if to whisper his last words of love. For him who was the fraternal friend, a son, a comrade in the struggle. A kiss makes that love immortal.
Gorbachev, Arafat. Mastroianni, Rosi, Moravia. Craxi, Spadolini. Giancarlo Pajetta trembles as he announces the remembrance. The Red Sea parts, as if for Moses, and even the enemy appears. Miraculously. Even Giorgio Almirante, the fascist executioner, bows to the Great Comrade. Interviews, memories, words of ordinary people flow. Many the sobs and countless the tears.
I wasn't there. And it pains me. I couldn’t love him when alive, when I could listen to him live and be infected by his ideas. I am loving him now as a distant spectator. And when I look around, I understand how great he was. Perhaps the only thing I hold against him, with due respect and a hint of fear, is that stubborn firmness towards the Red Brigades. Why did he not endorse the possibility of saving Moro? I will never have an answer, although I can imagine it would not have been easy to negotiate with terrorists, especially if they colluded with the State. But this we could not have known.
From this documentary, a very moving scene remains impressed in my mind. It shows how much he was loved and what politicians were like in the past. Not even that long ago. A child is interviewed who cannot contain his emotion. He must have been around ten years old or a little less. The white voice mixed with tears answers an essential question from the interviewer. What was Berlinguer to you? And he, with disarming sincerity that touches the heart, with a face still innocent and washed by tears, while twisting his lips into a grimace of pain... he was a good person...
He was a Communist. And I am proudly proud of it.
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