M. J Arocena The Italians are masters at laughing at themselves. I wonder if Iraq had developed that kind of self parody the world wouldn't have turned a much different place. I mention Iraq because, based on the tale told in "Seduced and Abandoned", the only difference between Sicily and Iraq is the name of their God. The great Pietro Germi designs a grotesquely comic masterpiece of such ferocity that the line between comedy and tragedy is indeed very thin. As is typical in a Germi film, the cast is uniformly sensational. Here, besides a very young and extraordinary Stefania Sandrelli, there is a superlative performance by Saro Urzi, the head of the family threatened by a devastating scandal. Ignorance and hypocrisy dissected with a refined, elegant hand. Observed with the acute, unsentimental eye of an outsider and yet, Pietro Germi, was an Italian who looked with affectionate horror at the cultural ties that kept his Country trailing behind the rest of the western world. Not to be missed.

Jinzo_Hydra Criterion Collection was generous enough to introduce me to Germi's works, first starting with Divorce, Italian Style. It was only natural that I followed up with Seduced and Abandoned, since I was blown away by Divorced, and had a newfound love of contemporary European cinema, especially from French and Italian filmmakers. I know it's relatively simple to find out about little gems of work from foreign directors (using IMDb, for example), but I'm grateful for a company like Criterion to steer me in the direction of fantastic films and the visionaries that create them. Saves me a lot of time and effort, haha.Now, I'm just some random nobody in his early 20's, born and raised on the prairie of Western Canada. In a sense, I may not be as "culturally perceptive" as someone hailing from a direct Old-World European background. But to discover a film such as Seduced and Abandoned, it was a guaranteed shock to see the enormity of differences between the values, traditions, and customs of Sicily compared to what I grew up in, astonishing since these worlds are separated only by a couple generations! Then again, forced marriage might be as frowned upon nowadays as if someone from that era might look into the future and see the overwhelming divorce rate of ours! It's really a subjectivity of time, where a brilliant, neorealist director, not unlike Germi, of our time will be able to capture a kind of absurdity in the way we deal with (or possibly lack thereof) now common principles and practices, such as infidelity, polygamy, same-sex unions, etc.I'm rambling. Seduced was a depressingly good movie. Sardonic and whimsical at the same time, this one had the ability to leave a bittersweet taste with me afterward, to not dismiss the ideals held in Sicilian culture a couple generations ago, but to ponder them, to compare them to the beliefs and mores of our generation.Sandrelli was phenomenal, as always. And I'm glad Germi cast Saro Urzi as the father instead of some North American counterpart, like Borgnine... Added to a certain authenticity that I wouldn't find if that'd been the case.Lando Buzzanca as Antonio, and Leopoldo Triste as the Baron were amazing as the kind of actors that kept the comedic ball rolling in this type of film; although Seduced is known as a key player in the Comedia d'all Italiano, without these laugh-out-loud performances, the film would be a depressing portrayal of old Italian values and nothing but.I look forward to the day when a company like Criterion will release more of Pietro Germi's film works (undoubtedly his 1950's dramatic working class oeuvre), to an international audience...Until then.

Howard Schumann When Agnese (Stefania Sandrelli), a fifteen-year old girl, is seduced and impregnated by her older sister's fiancé, the stage is set for a series of events that involve an attempted murder, an abortive suicide attempt, a protracted court battle, and a fake kidnapping. A wicked satire from Pietro Germi, Seduced and Abandoned lampoons the macho morality, legal system, and hypocrisy of Sicily in the early 1960s. Though it seems a bit overlong, it is a very funny film that shows how outmoded codes of honor can stifle individuality, and the consequences that result when a family's reputation becomes more important than their happiness.Saro Urzi won the award for Best Actor at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival and he turns in a dominating performance as Vincenzo Ascalone, the ebullient patriarch who is determined to preserve the family honor at any cost. After discovering that his young daughter Agnese has been seduced by Peppino Califano (Aldo Puglisi), daughter Mathilde's (Paola Biggio) fiancé, he goes into a rage, first against Agnese than against the cowardly Peppino, assaulting him in front of his parents. He demands that Peppino break off the engagement with Mathilde and marry Agnese, but Peppino hypocritically proclaims that he will not married a defiled woman though in fact he was the defiler.When Peppino hightails it out of town and hides in a monastery, Vincenzo persuades his son Antonio to hunt him down and kill him but the murder plot turns into another farce after Agnese informs the police (who are about as competent as the lawmen on The Dukes of Hazzard TV series). The bumpy affair finally ends up in court where the only thing that can prevent Peppino from jail is marriage but the proud papa refuses his daughter's hand. This forces Peppino to stage a false kidnapping and it goes on from there, full of twists and turns that left me a bit worn out but full of smiles.

Manicheus Granted, it's not as polished or swanky as "Divorce". No dashing Marcello, no Sophia's curves. Perhaps it dabs in paint too close to that of his more famous predecessor. Yet, what delightful film! The comedy of manners and mores can rarely get any better. And then the cutting, darker, a bit menacing undertones that reveal that fascinating Sicilia of times now lost forever: wow! I love both of Germi's gems but if I could take only one with me it would be "Sedotta e abbandonata". I also marvel at how well Germi, himself un Genovese, understood the very heart and soul of that lovely island off the boot of Italy. Almost perfect: who cares for perfection anyway?