Overview: A happily married businessman (Ugo Tognazzi, La Cage aux Folles) succumbs to the advances of one of his less square, more open-minded female friends. His eyes now open to the rampant adultery among his high-society acquaintances, he is amazed at the ease with which they lie to their loved ones. Soon, he begins to suspect his loving wife (Claudia Cardinale, Fitzcarraldo) of infidelity - even as she guesses nothing of his own extramarital affair.

Antonio Pietrangeli’s luscious adaptation of Fernand Crommelynck’s tale of obsession and delusion skewers the changing mores and tenacious prejudices of 1960s Italian society with style. As the troubled husband’s paranoia takes him ever further away from reality, his fantasies come to life in sumptuous dream sequences, each one a dashing tribute to the radiant charm of Claudia Cardinale.

Blu-ray Verdict: Simply put, this film is just such a wonderful comedy. It is very well cast and well-acted; both Ugo Tognazzi and Claudia Cardinale are excellent and the film has many fun-filled moments. However, I would not describe and classify this movie as a light work. The husband’s idee fixe might give the viewers the impression of a silly, obsessive, and paranoid person and (I will admit it) his behavior does make the audience laugh.

He is convinced and determined that his wife is cheating on him - even though she is not being unfaithful. When he looks at her it becomes obvious to him that she is a very attractive woman. And all the men around her must be dying to be with her. The key issue, however, is (to use a proper term) his projection.

The main reason of his jealousy is his infidelities. If he were in a psychoanalyst’s couch talking about his feelings the picture - no pun intended - would have become crystal clear indeed.

In closing, this superb comedy understands cuckoldry as a fantasy generated by jealousy itself. Suspicion becomes creative, masochistic, and theatrical, turning marriage into a stage on which masculine authority repeatedly wounds itself. The result is a lucid study of desire disguised as anxiety, and of a bourgeois masculinity secretly fascinated by the very loss of control it claims to resist. [R.T.]

4K ULTRA HD LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS:
4K restoration of the film from the original camera negative by the Cineteca di Bologna in collaboration with Compass Film and Studio Cine
Uncompressed mono PCM audio
New interview with Italian film expert Richard Dyer
New visual essay by Italian cinema professor Rémi Fournier Lanzoni
Alternative colour sequences
Newly improved English subtitle translation
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow
Limited edition booklet featuring new writing by film critic Phuong Le and archival writing

Official Purchase Link

www.radiancefilms.co.uk