123 When you are happy, pay attention to it

Antonio Padellaro (When We Were Happy, Piemme) begins this time with an intimate conversation and a flow of memories. The person he's talking to is his wife during a difficult time with her illness; the memories are of their holiday home in Versilia, surrounded by relatives and cousins, in the summer of the 1960s. But the narrative soon becomes a wide-angle lens, encompassing Italy's economic miracle and the Cuban Missile Crisis. It's a portrait of a world where happiness seemed an acquired right and politics still retained the flavor of a collective destiny. Saverio Simonelli.