14/09/2010

There may be exotic beaches and bathing beauties (including Michela Quattrociocche, Elena Russo and Laura Torrisi), but don’t call it a cinepanettone [the bawdy Christmas blockbusters]. Sharm el Sheikh [+see also:
trailer
film profile], says director Ugo Fabrizio Giordani, "is a comedy, not a comical film, which takes a light-hearted look at a serious subject: losing one’s job".

Fabio Romano (Enrico Brignano) and his co-worker De Pascalis (Maurizio Casagrande) sell life insurance, until a change at the top of the company brings sobering news: there’s room for only one of them.

To gain favour with the new, sly boss (Giorgio Panariello) con le mani in pasta everywhere, the two decide to leave for the Red Sea, with their families in tow. Where, among the Sinai Desert and Turkish baths, the children and stepchildren of the three protagonists naturally get tangled up in all kinds of emotional intrigues. Of particular note is Gabriele Penteriani's turn as a young nerd.

Given the vacation spot background, comparisons with the Christmas blockbusters produced by Aurelio De Laurentiis are impossible to avoid. But the cast and director are quick to disagree.

"Often, the comedy [of those films] is debased by profanity and cheap allusions", says Brignano, and the comment to the various films seems spot-on. Here, instead, there’s a lot of skin (which is obliged, given the location), and a lot of the pettiness between the two desperate men who’ll try anything to keep their jobs, but no gratuitous vulgarity.

There’s even a nod to A Difficult Life, the masterpiece by Dino Risi; an homage to the best of the commedia all'Italiana, from a director who previously worked as assistant to Ettore Scola.

Produced with Medusa Film by Marco Poccioni and Marco Valsania for Rodeo Drive, Sharm el Sheikh is being released domestically on September 17 by Medusa on 350 screens.

(Translated from Italian)