Mrs. Mussolini Can't Keep Her Head Either

Aside from the endless newsreels of Hitler screaming to thousands while pounding his fists, no image of World War II is any stronger than the truly bizarre smirk that adorned Italian's fascist leader, Benito Mussolini, as he stood before his adoring Italian throngs. One could argue that Mussolini's hanging when things went south would be right up there, too.

In "Vincere", Marco Bellochio brings us a completely different, up-close and personal view of Mussolini, but the primary focus is not on Benito, but rather on his first wife, Ida Dalser. When the young and beautiful Ida (Giovanna Mezzogiorno) first sees Benito (Filippo Timi), he is in the middle of a fiery speech at a local political event. She is immediately smitten by both his looks and presence. They marry and Benito Jr. soon follows. Then World War I breaks out and Benito is off to war. The next time she sees him, he is in a hospital and being tended to by Rachele, who it turns out Benito has married. He neglected to tell Ida about this and acts as if he was never married to Ida. This, to put it mildly, displeases Ida.

The rest of "Vincere" is watching Ida getting angrier, more frustrated and borderline nuts. Benito is rising through the ranks of politics and has her led away each time she tries to insert herself back into his life. After a while it all becomes tiresome to watch, primarily because, in my opinion, Ms. Mezzogiorno, is overacting. Yeah, I know I've never been in a spot similar to hers so I can't feel her pain, but she wore me down and made me laughingly think to myself that Benito had probably made a wise decision to move on. 

"Vincere" is professional, tells a good story and concerns an important historical time, but unfortunately it doesn't hold completely together. Benito gets his head handed to him at the end, which is certainly a good thing, but I would have rather seen more about him and less about the driven lady. Of course, that would have been an entirely different film.