John Duncombe, the British consul in Florence, returns home from his wife’s funeral to his two children, who are unaware of their mother’s passing. He makes the decision to tell his eldest son, Andrea, but hides the truth from his sickly younger son, Milo. Director Luigi Comenicini (The Sunday Woman) captures the innocence and carefree moments of youth alongside the agonising feelings of grief, creating one of the finest films about childhood, one which can stand alongside The 400 Blows, The Spirit of the Beehive and L'enfance nue. A Palme d’Or nominee at the Cannes Film Festival and recipient of multiple awards from Italian institutions, Misunderstood features remarkable performances from the children and from Anthony Quayle (Lawrence of Arabia) as Duncombe.
LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURES
New 2024 2K restoration from the original negative
Uncompressed mono PCM audio
Interview with co-screenwriter Piero De Bernardi and Cristina Comenicini, the director’s daughter and herself a noted filmmaker (2008, 36 mins)
Interview with legendary critic Michel Ciment (2021, 24 mins)
A Child’s Heart - a visual essay by David Cairns on Comencini and the filmmaker’s affinity for childhood stories (2023, 25 mins)
Trailer
Newly translated English subtitles
Reversible sleeve featuring designs based on original promotional materials
Limited edition booklet featuring new writing by critic Manuela Lazic and a newly translated archival interview with Comencini
Limited edition of 3000 copies, presented in full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings
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Cert: TBC
Format: Blu-ray
Region: AB
RAD051BDLE
EAN: 5060974680962
Release date: 29/04/24
Press:
“One of the most beautiful portraits of a child in the history of the cinema”- Claude Michel Cluny, Cinéma
“This pure melodrama, perhaps the most devastating ever made in the history of Cinema, to be placed on a level with the greatest works of Griffith and Sirk.” - Guy Bracourt
“Comencini treats a difficult subject of great importance: the misunderstanding between a father and his son, and gets results that are not only devastating but also highly believable.” - Bertrand Tavernier, Positif
“Made in 1966, this masterpiece by Luigi Comencini has lost none of its radiant beauty or its subversive force.” Le Monde (1978)
I spent most of my time resisting this film with all my might. You can see the melodramatic payoff coming a mile away (the only question is how overblown will it be? Turns out this film does go up to eleven), and the narrative manipulation to ensure that the elder son is perpetually 'misunderstood' is pretty threadbare at times. But. . . Comencini, little by little, accrues enough little surprising details of character and action to forestall dismissal, and by the closing moments he's jerked the tears like a dentist removing teeth willy-nilly with pliers. You may still be rolling your eyes at the choice of final shot, but they'll nevertheless be watering. Looking back, there's a lot of skill to appreciate, particularly in the central performance by Stefano Colagrande, Armando Nannuzzi's beautiful cinematography, and the strategically distracting lavishness of the setting, but essentially this is an expertly engineered emotional carnival ride.
