The Taviani brothers' -- Paolo and Vittorio's -- Cannes festival award-winner, a parable of oppression adapted from Gavino Ledda's autobiography about his ascendancy from Sardinian shepherd to linguist. The hero's moments of enlightment -- his discovery of music, his instruction in Latin -- are truly inspiring, but the moviemakers dwell longer on the barbarism from which he raised himself: his father comes to yank him out of the schoolroom and, shamefaced, he pees in his pants; he runs away from a snake in fright and his father, to teach him a lesson, drags him back and flogs him with the reptile; and so on. The movie is renowned for the inventiveness of its soundtrack: the ornery goat who delivers a Mr. Ed interior monolog as he defecates maliciously into a milk pail is not, however, the best example of that inventiveness; neither is the choral orgasmic moaning that crescendos over the countryside at night. (1977) — Duncan Shepherd
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