“My wife gave me a big kiss this morning. I only get kisses once a month, on payday.”Il posto [The Job] (Ermanno Olmi, 1961)
Apr
3
World Party Day
Two office workers awkwardly dancing cheek to cheek at the company Christmas party. She's in her finest cocktail dress and pearls, he listlessly wears a mock sheriff's hat. DP: Lamberto Caimi.
To support his family, small-town boy Domenico moves to Milan in the hope to find a job. Eventually he's employed, as a clerk in a drab office replacing a senior worker who died. While the days drag on, only interrupted by coffee shop small talk with fellow teenager Antonietta, the Christmas office #party draws nearer.
– Sartori
With the dark absurdity of coming out of fascism and having to run a real-world country with a naive ineptitude – represented by the too-large-borrowed-from-father-suits – and pretence childlike bureaucratic procedures, Olmi's Il posto is a wonderfully sharp observation of postwar Italy.