Ciao maschio

Ferreri explores themes of generational change and decline (and by analogy even entire civilizations) with his typical dark humor in this film. He also delves into the topic he often dissects - men versus women, suggesting that the future will inevitably belong to those damn feminists. The longing and despairing efforts of the older Luigi (Mastroianni) to regain a sense of life are doomed to failure. Even the younger Lafayette (Depardieu) will not ultimately achieve victory, and the joint effort of the two - to raise their own successor in the form of a "male", little King Kong, will end in the irreversible movement of human history: he is devoured by rats, just as only those cursed rats survive every civilization. It is important to remember who passed this judgment on history - precisely the representative of a civilization that has already been condemned and consigned to the dustbin of history (the owner of the Roman History Museum). The tragic realization, especially for Luigi, is revealed in the apparently random or mistaken gender swap of the little monkey in his will. (2013.09.02)