Line #5 Film/TheGardenOfTheFinziContinis


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/image_w448.jpg]]
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3	''The Garden of the Finzi-Continis'' is a 1970 Italian drama film directed by Creator/VittorioDeSica.
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5	The film covers events from 1938 to 1943 in the town of Ferrara. At the start of the film UsefulNotes/FascistItaly, prior to this date not at all antisemitic, has followed the lead of UsefulNotes/BenitoMussolini's German masters and passed anti-Jewish race laws. Since the Jews of Ferrara are no longer allowed to play tennis in the local tennis club, they go to the home of the Finzi-Continis, an absurdly wealthy Jewish family who live in an enormous mansion on an estate that is protected by high walls and boasts spacious gardens as well as a tennis court. Their great wealth and high walls insulate them from the gradually deteriorating conditions of life for Italy's other Jews.
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7	Giorgio is the son of a middle-class Jewish family, long friends of the Finzi-Continis; he plays tennis on their court and studies with the Finzi-Contini patriarch, a professor. Giorgio is desperately in love with Micòl Finzi-Contini, the professor's dazzlingly beautiful daughter and his friend since childhood, but her feelings towards him are more ambiguous. Other people in their social circle include Micòl's brother Alberto, Giorgio's brother Ernesto, another local Jew named Bruno Lattes, and Giampiero Malnate, who is a Gentile but an anti-fascist.
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9	----
10	!!Tropes:
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12	* AllGirlsWantBadBoys: Micòl rejects polite, gentlemanly Giorgio, and has sex with Giampiero, the brash young man who talks about how much he likes sluts.
13	* DayOfTheJackboot: The jackboot has already been on Italy's neck for 16 years or so, but this film depicts the point at which it turned against the country's Jews.
14	* DownerEnding: And how. The Finzi-Continis are rounded up along with Giorgio's father. In RealLife [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrara#Jewish_community almost all]] the Jews of Ferrara that were arrested died in the Holocaust.
15	* TheFilmOfTheBook: From a 1962 novel by Giorgio Bassani, a Jew from Ferrara whose father was rounded up and sent to his death in a German camp. Bassani was so angry at the film for certain changes (one was making Micòl and Bruno's relationship explicit) that he had his name removed from the screenplay credit.
16	* {{Flashback}}: Multiple flashbacks showing the childhood friendship of Giorgio and Micòl.
17	* HidingBehindTheLanguageBarrier: Giorgio's parents sometimes speak in French when they don't want the maid to know what they're saying.
18	* IDontWantToRuinOurFriendship: Although the real reason is that Micòl simply doesn't find Giorgio attractive.
19	* ImpairmentShot: As Alberto is dying of...something (TB?), the POV shot occasionally goes out of focus.
20	* IntroDump: Giorgio is introduced to several of the other characters when entering the garden at the start of the movie.
21	* JustFriends: Giorgio and Micòl, much to his displeasure, due to her utter lack of romantic interest in him.
22	* MyGirlIsASlut: Bruno says he likes his girlfriend Gladys precisely because she is so slutty.
23	* OuijaBoard: The friends play a variant with a wine glass and letters arranged in a circle. The glass predicts the coming of war.
24	* ThePeepingTom: Giorgio does this when he sees Micol fleeing across the grounds of the garden, follows her, and looks through a window to see her in the aftermath of sex with Giampiero.
25	* PunchClockVillain: The library manager who casually tosses Giorgio out, blaming it on regulations, while having the gall to ask how Giorgio's poetry is coming along.
26	* SelectiveObliviousness: For a long time Giorgio's father, who was himself a fascist before Italian fascism turned antisemitic, simply refuses to acknowledge how bad things are getting for Italy's Jews.
27	* SexySoakedShirt: Micòl's white blouse hides nothing after she and Giorgio are caught in the rain. Sex almost follows, but she stops it for reasons that later become clear.
28	* ShamelessFanserviceGirl: When Micòl catches Giorgio peeping on her and Bruno, she deliberately exposes her breasts.
29	* StateSec: [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OVRA OVRA]], the Fascist secret police that are rounding up Jews at the end of the movie.
30	* StockFootage: In a couple of scenes characters are shown watching newsreels of fascist rallies and, later, combat.
31	* TrainStationGoodbye: Giorgio bids Alberto goodbye when Alberto goes to France to study.
32	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: So, ''did'' Giorgio escape? [[AllThereInTheManual The source novel reveals]] that yes, he did.
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Context Film / TheGardenOfTheFinziContinis