Time.news – The holidays are approaching and Netflix decides to give its subscribers a gift by programming the comedy from 19 December ‘Christmas at all costs’ by Giovanni Bognetti with Christian De Sica and Angela Finocchiaro, Dharma Mangia Woods and Claudio Colica. It’s about “a Christmas comedy and not a cinepanettone“, underline the protagonists, a remake of a successful French film (‘Mes Tre’s Chers Enfants’ written and directed by Alexandra Leclére) produced by Iginio Straffi and Alessandro Usai for Colorado Film in association with Sony Pictures International Productions in collaboration with Rti. After twenty-five years the perfect family separates: the children, Alessandra (Dharma Mangia Woods) and Emilio (Claudio Colica), leave the nest and the province and go to live in the city leaving their parents, Carlo (Christian De Sica) and Anna (Angela Finocchiaro ), finally alone.
Within a few months, the boys, taken by their new life, limit relations with their parents to a few short callsthey miss their relatives’ funerals, they no longer show up for birthdays and, as a final straw, they announce that they won’t be spending Christmas with their family.
Angry and desperate, Carlo and Anna decide to lie by pretending to have inherited six million euros from an old aunt in order to get their children back. The only one who knows about the deception is Anna’s mother (Fioretta Mari), a foul-mouthed, irreverent and very witty woman.
The plan seems to work and, driven by the hope of being able to have their share of the inheritance to make their dreams come true, the children magically reappear, even assuring that they cannot miss Christmas with the family. Obviously the situation will soon become unsustainable until the epilogue, positive and unexpected. In the cast, in the role of a nosy neighbor, also Iaia Forte.
“When they called me for this film they showed me the French protagonists – says De Sica during the press conference at the Braberini cinema – two monsters, two fat men… I was scared! Instead they chose us for this too, not they don’t call me The body at all,” the actor jokes.
Then, returning to the question of comedy and not cinepanettone, he is keen to clarify: “I don’t deny the cinepanettone that has given me great success, but I’m happy to be back to making a comedy after making several farces – he explains – I don’t know if today there is still room for cinepanettoni, what I can say is that they no longer offered them to me. If they did I would go there in a hurry. On my social networks – he continues – when I posted the film poster I had over a thousand comments and many asked me to go back to being a cinepanettone. There is actually an age to play roles. Imagine Sordi making ‘An American in Rome’ at the age of 70 or my brother-in-law Carlo Verdone remaking ‘A beautiful bag’? If Boldi and I did another ‘Yuppies’ – he continues – they would spit in our faces”.
That times have changed is a fact. Even for those who do his job. “If I went back now to making a cinepanettone like the ones I used to make with Of Lawrence – reasons De Sica – I would go to prison, think of what I haven’t done in the movies. The fact is that he laughs with the devil, not with St. Francis because St. Francis is not funny. He laughs meanly, “but today there is a fear of offending and only Checco Zalone, adds De Sica,” has the courage to be irreverent and incorrect. And the audience appreciates it.” As for the others, “I see they’re all smart comedies, but he laughs less. There aren’t those roars that were once heard in the hall”.
“Before you criticize a joke from the trailer you have to see the film.” Christian De Sica returns, during the ‘Christmas at all costs’ press conference, to the controversies related to the advertising trailer in which he told his son (Claudio Colica) that Abruzzo wine is a m …. “I want to tell the president of Abruzzo to be patient and to watch the film – explains the Roman actor – because in the scene I then add: ‘No, I’m joking, it’s good. It’s full-bodied. Because in the scene my son brings me a wine and I say those words for him, not for the wine. The wine has nothing to do with it“, points out.
On the controversy born for having offended the sensitivity of the Abruzzo people, De Sica returns even later speaking of today’s difficulty in making people laugh by trying to be politically correct. “If what happened for a joke about Abruzzo wine happened, think about what I didn’t do in my films”, in De Laurentiis’ cinepanettoni that would be unthinkable today: “If I were making those Christmas films now, I would go to prison”, he comments with a touch of bitterness.