The Sunday Woman

The Sunday Woman

The Sunday Woman (La donna della domenica) is a crime comedy from 1975 by Luigi Comencini.

The architect Garrone (Claudio Gora), disliked by many for his mannerisms but nevertheless well connected and uninvited fixture at every dinner party, is found brutally murdered. His skull bashed in by a phallic object. Commissioner Santamaria (Marcello Mastroianni) sets out to investigate, which leads him deep into Torino’s high society. A written note by Madame Carla Dosio (Jacqueline Bisset) turns up at the police station, instantly making her and her friend Massimo Campi (Jean-Louis Trintignant), another rich man, instant suspects in the case. The cop develops a thing for her, discovers Campi to be a homosexual and quickly turns up a whole lot of other suspects. Lucky for him, Carla is excited by the commotion and digs up clues herself….

The Sunday Woman is an interesting movie, for many reasons. First of all, it’s not the usual polizio or giallo genre dominating Italian crime cinema normally from out of the era. Second, it’s also not the usual (badly aged) slapstick comedy (say, Ciccio and Ingrassia, or, say Adriano Celentano if you need names). Third, it’s not exactly a dead-serious or super high brow socio-critical drama either. So what is it? While showing elements of the typical cop movie (an investigator at the center of the story, fighting internal bureaucracy and pressures), mysterious murders (a giallo would be bloodier and have typical stylistic devices such as more sharply edged murder weapons, sexual kinks and black gloves maybe, however we do have the phallic object….), lots of humor (bordering on slapstick, with recurring punchlines, but never really dominating to a point where I would call this a comedy) and critique especially of the upper class, it’s none of these. Let’s call it a gender-bender.

The Sunday Woman

The murder mystery at the core of the story is but the thread holding this together. It works absolutely great as a movie because of its subtle, not too heavy handed, critique of high society life and some serious topics such as the perception of homosexuality sprinkled over it. The script is whip-smart, the dialogue to the point and the various jabs and jokes are precise and recurring. What makes the murder mystery such a draw is the detective who tries to blend into noble circles, who however just enjoy the whole investigation as great fun and distraction. The Lady Dosio is actually the one peeling back the onion of the case rather than him, and she does it out of pure curiosity and playfulness. Bisset is a blast in this, she is radiant if you will, boasting a blown up hairdo so modern at the time she could be time travelling in from the late 70s. Mastroianni meanwhile playing kind of a doofus, I would even go as far and say as he’s being outgunned by the other mimes in this production.

The Sunday Woman

As I said, there is plenty of witty humor, but generally this is a serious whodunnit. And the seriousity also stems not from the boring games of high society (even though that is a bitter reality: the architect was hated by all, and yet they all have their perversions and digressions). It tems to a large part from the portraial of homosexuality and the role of the Campi character and his lover. This adds a mature angle to this narrative. Trintignant’s character is a twist on the element of suppressed homosexuality that also features in his role in in Bertolucci’s The Conformist. The depiction of homosecuality is of course 70s cringeworthy but okay. All in all, I was flabbergasted by the interplay of the characters, the witty dialogue and especially Bisset’s charms and attitude in this (I saw a version of this movie on Youtube in French, from her lip movement I suspect she filmed her scenes in French).

The Sunday Woman

Director Luigi Comencini (Misunderstood) has quite an ecclectic filmography full of interesting titles, so I am in dire need to discover him, this being the first film of his I have seen, to my shame. He executes this 110min features with stage play precision, greatly helped by magnificent photography and the aforementioned excellent script. Not so much help is Ennio Morricone‘s score, which is rather unimpressive and seems to consist mostly of recycled motifs. Huge credit of course goes to the writers of this adaptation (of the novel of the same title by Carlo Fruttero and Franco Lucentini), namely two time Oscar nominee Agenore Incrocci (The Pizza Triangle, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly) and Furio Scarpelli (who worked with him on the same movies, but he also wrote for example Il Postino) the latter also adpted the novel once more for a 2011 television movie by the way. All in all I had great fun enjoying The Sunday Woman, an impressive, well made, beautiful looking and smart crime sort-of-comedy that deserves to be seen!

The Sunday Woman

Radiance Films brings this little seen movie to HD for the first time on a new limited edition BluRay and it is a sight to be seen. The 2K restoration presents the film in a splendid transfer, with rich texture and contrast, sharp close ups and vibrant colors. It is a really fine looking presentation doing the movie’s expert cinematography and especially set design justice. Film grain is preserved, with very little digital touchup or filtering going on. I wasnt too happy with skin color but then again, we’re talking the 70s, not 2000s style lighting and makeup. Now, the film was shot in open matte, because it was intended for television, but there’s a 1.85:1 widescreen version as well, and the BluRay houses both. I opted for the widescreen presentation. There’s only the Italian audio track, which sounds absolutely fine and plenty dynamic for a 70s monaural track. The English subtitles appear to be very good judging from my limited Italian.

The Sunday Woman

Now for the extras. First of, there is a newly filmed interview with academic and Italian cinema expert Richard Dyer, who looks at The Sunday Woman (2022, 18 mins) and this works well as an introduction of sorts. However, I wonder if just like the rest of the extras, are better left to enjoy after seeing the movie (while of course there are some things about the movie that can be better enjoyed understanding more about the material, but who’s stopping you from watching it twice). Also on bord is an archival interview with cinematographer Luciano Tovoli (The Passenger) who discusses his work on the film (2008, 22 mins, Italian with English subtitles) at great length and seems to remember more and more as he goes on telling us about his work with Comencini. A newly filmed interview by Federico Caddeo with academic and screenwriter Giacomo Scarpelli is included, who discusses the life and work of his father, Furio Scarpelli and his writing partner Agenore Incrocci (2022, 36 mins, Italian with English subtitles). This is quite insightful (and extensive) and Giacomo is full of stories and anecdotes and backgrounds not necessarily just about this film but about the people, era and business at the time. Certainly very enjoyable and informative. Then there is also an interesting but short archival French TV interview with Jean-Louis Trintignant (1976, 4 mins, French with English subtitles). Lastly, the trailer (Italian with English subtitles, fullscreen).

There’s a reversible sleeve featuring designs based on original posters and as long as you pick this up during its limited run, there’s a 24-page booklet featuring new writing on the film by Mariangela Sansone and a reprint of an archival piece on the film. I didn’t have these available for this review. All in all a splendid presentation of a delightful film that deserves to be seen more widely.

Buy now: From Amazon.co.uk | From Amazon.com

Review copy courtesy of Radiance Films. Screenshots humbly borrowed from the good folks at bluray.com
Radiance Films

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