MANY SPOILERS "Catene" "Tormato" ,films starring the same principals,are melodramas,the whole melodrama and nothing but melodrama. In "I Figli Di Nessuno" ,Raffaello Nazzari appears as the Italian Douglas Sirk.
Now Douglas Sirk appears like some kind of melodrama revolutionary whereas directors such as Nazzari are dismissed as unhip;just compare the endings of "Figli" and "Imitation of life" (1959):both movies end with a funeral ,and dare it be said,Sirk is more reactionary than his Italian colleague:betraying the original novel by Fanny Hurst,he makes black servant Annie a woman who knows her place and whose only hope is to have a beautiful funeral!
"Figli"'s final scene is ,though melodramatic to a fault,extremely beautiful:"it's no sacrilege ,says the "white angel" ,it's for an angel who is already with You",as she throws the flowers on the coffin from her convent's window.
"figli" includes several stand out scenes :
-the old countess (Françoise Rosay ,in one of her nastiest parts ,the French should appreciate) dying when her daughter-in-law is stealing her testament.
-The meeting on the road between the son and the nun,near the well;it looks like a dreamlike sequence,and when the desperate father tells his dying son his mom is gone to heaven,we do believe for a short while, that it was a supernatural scene .
-The boy,working in a quarry,who takes a rebel stand and refuses his boss's (actually his father) charity ;in melodramas,children are often nice,gentle and sniveling:this brat is not ,he is proud and sides with the working men,sweating Under the sun ,for a starvation wage .
Of course there are many coincidences ,implausibilities,but not more than in Sirk's "magnificent obsession" ;besides the female lead ,Yvonne Samson has not that much time on the screen;which tends to show that Nazarro made the Young illegitimate son the real hero of the movie (check the title :"nobody's son").
When the movie was released ,the Office Catholique Du Cinema" blamed the priest for violating the seal of confession.
The ending must have sent the viewers tearing to an entire box of Kleenex;that's probably why the director felt compelled to film " white angel" ,a sequel,more far-fetched than "Figlio".
If you like melodramas ,this is a must.And I love Douglas Sirk too,mind you,but do not use his name and fame to put other directors down.Nazzaro is no genius,but he is skillful at creating good melodramas.
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