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I basilischi
I basilischi
Directed by	Lina Wertmüller
Written by	Lina Wertmüller
Produced by	Lionello Santi
Cinematography	Gianni Di Venanzo
Edited by	Ruggero Mastroianni
Music by	Ennio Morricone
Production; companies	Galatea Film; Società Editoriale Cinematografica Italiana 22 Dicembre;
Distributed by	Cineriz
Release date	1963;
Running time	85 minutes
Country	Italy
Language	Italian
Budget	£28,000

I basilischi,^[2] English language titles The Basilisks or The Lizards, is a 1963 Italian comedy-drama film written and directed by Lina Wertmüller. It was Wertmüller's directorial debut.

Plot

Francesco, Sergio, and Antonio are three privileged young individuals residing in a typical provincial town, Minervino Murge, located between Puglia and Basilicata. The film portrays their lives, now saturated with apathy and provincialism, hindering any genuine desire to pursue more stimulating horizons.

When Antonio's aunt, an indifferent university student, offers him the opportunity to live with her in Rome and transfer his enrollment from the University of Bari to the capital, he eventually declines. Incapable of abandoning the ingrained prejudices, stereotypes, and rituals of his native province, he returns to the village, his decision irreversible.

The conclusion features a quote from the Southern Italian scholar Giustino Fortunato: "We are what race, climate, location, and history have determined us to be."^[3]

Cast

Antonio Petruzzi as Tony
Stefano Satta Flores as Francesco
Sergio Ferrarino as Sergio
Luigi Barbieri as Antonio's father
Flora Carabella as Luciana Bonfanti

Legacy

I basilischi was shown as part of the retrospective "Questi fantasmi: Cinema italiano ritrovato" at the 65th Venice International Film Festival.^[4]^[5] A 4K restoration of the film was screened at the Museum of Modern Art in December 2023.^[6]

References

^ Caute, David (1994). Joseph Losey. Oxford University Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-19-506410-0.
^ "The word "basilisco," derived from Greek, means little king, but it also refers to a genus of reptiles in tropical America. In the Middle Ages, the name basilisco was given to an imaginary creature, with a snake-like body and a head adorned with three small pointed protrusions. According to the beliefs of the time, the basilisk could cause death with its gaze and would die upon seeing itself in a mirror: this seems to be the zoological version of the mythological story of Narcissus. I believe that in the title of the film, a certain ambiguity or, if preferred, ambivalence persists. However, since the director was inspired by Federico Fellini's I vitelloni, a film from 1953, it could be inferred that "I basilischi," rather than evoking Byzantine reality and royalty, just like Fellini's masterpiece, alludes to and refers to a kind of ideal-typical - absit iniuria verbis - zoo-anthropological scenario, which Fellini first and Wertmüller later enjoy ridiculing. The geographical, economic, and social contexts are different, but the protagonists, mutatis mutandis, seem to be the same: the basilischi are indeed the local "vitelloni," from Basilicata." - Viscardi Giuseppe Maria, in his work titled La Basilicata tra il Cristo di Levi e il familismo amorale di Banfield, Ricerche di storia sociale e religiosa: 80, 2, 2011, p. 300 (Rome: Storia e letteratura, 2011).
^ Pietro Borraro, La questione meridionale da Giustino Fortunato ad oggi, Congedo, 1977, p. 139
^ Simone Pinchiorri (28 July 2008). "Mostra di Venezia 2008: "Questi Fantasmi: Cinema Italiano Ritrovato (1946 – 1975)"". CinemaItaliano. Retrieved 18 April 2013.
^ Luigi Paini (26 August 2008). "65ª mostra di Venezia. L'Italia prenota la prima fila". Il Sole 24 Ore. Retrieved 18 April 2013.
^ "I basilischi (The Lizards). 1963. Written and directed by Lina Wertmüller". Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved 16 December 2023.