Male Anxiety and Psychopathology in Film: Comedy Italian Style [Hardcover]

The most popular film genre during the golden years of Italian cinema, the Comedy Italian Style emerged after the fall of the Facist regime, narrating the identity crisis of many Italian men. Exploring the birth, growth, and decline of this genre, Bini shows this notable style was the search for a new role in the shattered postwar middle class.

The author advances her argument through insightful close readings of a large number of films. She limns the relevant theory as it arises without grinding the analysis to a halt. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. (M. Yacowar, Choice, Vol. 53 (10), June, 2016)

Bini's innovative approach to one of the most popular types of Italian cinema, commedia all'italiana, is a much-needed addition to the field. The author's thorough and insightful close analyses of works from the 1950s and 1960s expose readers to a wide variety of Italian comedies, many of which are not well known in the English-speaking world. His thesis that cinema anticipated the boom that arose from a crisis regarding national identity, exposed by the failures of fascism, is particularly compelling. - Mary Ann McDonald Carolan, Associate Professor of Modern Languages & Literature, Fairfield University, USA