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Lino Banfi
from ICFF 2022 - Program Booklet
by ICFF
By Tonia Serrao Soppelsa Who, of those that have any connection to Italy, hasn't at least once in their life, uttered one of Lino Banfi 's cult jokes? His unmistakable Pugliese accent has conquered generations of Italians, from north to south, and abroad. Many —and I for one— have hurled “Disgrazieto“at someone, for the pure joy of it. Even the national football team during the Italy - Turkey game at the 2021 European Championships saw Ciro Immobile and Lorenzo Insigne rejoicing after a goal and shouting “Porca puttena!“. This of course was a salute to Banfi in his role as Oronzo Canà, the legendary Longobard coach in his cult fi lm L’Allenatore Nel Pallone (The Soccer Coach).
Lino Banfi is perhaps the best representative, or rather advocate, of the brand of comedy that hails from Bari, and which has managed to overcome the borders of Puglia and conquer a large audience. He has made a career, from his start in cinema to the present, of playing with the clichés, vices and defects of Italians. And he does so with wisdom and humour making fun of the stereotype of the noisy Pugliese, exaggerated in his gestures, and with a language incomprehensible to many.
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Many are the jokes, indeed the catchphrases, taken up by the actor in his fi lms which have entered the common language. Lines such as “Madooonna Benedetta dell'Incoroneta“, “Ti spezzo la noce del capocollo“, and “Disgrazieto“, to name a few, have been pronounced in scenes such as the famous one in the bathtub, in the 1983 fi lm Occhio, Malocchio, Prezzemolo e Finocchio, by director Sergio Martino. What do these comic, garbled, dialectical words mean? No translation available, I’m afraid.
HE HAS MADE A CAREER, FROM HIS START IN CINEMA TO THE PRESENT, OF PLAYING WITH THE CLICHÉS, VICES AND DEFECTS OF ITALIANS.
And what of the critics? To those that take umbrage to his making fun of the Pugliese dialect, Banfi answers that he just wants to bring “Pugliesità“ to the rest of the world, “because we [the Pugliesi] are a beautiful people without the drama of the Neapolitans or the Sicilians. I hope I have opened a new path “, concludes Banfi .
