Fantozzi Against the Wind

Ugo Fantozzi is a minor clerk in a company and his life consists of being humiliated. His bosses grind him down, his colleagues use him, his wife and daughter are embarrassed by him. This instalment keeps the same order: compulsory company events, holiday disasters, and plans that go wrong at every opportunity. The subject is not comedy but how the Italian middle class sees itself. Fantozzi became such a recognised type in Italy that his name and his mangled grammar entered everyday speech as shorthand for clerical life and hierarchy. The form works like a run of sketches: independent episodes arrive one after another with no strong plot between them. The character was created by Paolo Villaggio himself. Fantozzi was born first as a book, then moved to television and cinema; the series ran to ten films and Villaggio played him for forty years. This instalment has a new director: Neri Parenti took over and went on to make most of the later films. Milena Vukotić plays his wife and Gigi Reder his colleague. Who it is for: anyone curious about Italian popular comedy and long series built on one character. Who it is not for: viewers without the context; some jokes rest on Italian working life and references of the period.