Welcome to Rome, Caterina – Watch Your Back

In the first scene of Caterina in the Big City, Caterina’s father, Giancarlo, a teacher, is giving his last day of school  “so long sucker” speech to his class. He’s finally being transferred to a school in Rome and away from this loser one in his hick town.
…I wanted to tell you all one thing – that all the hours that we’ve spent together in this classroom have been the most useless and depressing of my life and I wonder why we bothered coming to this school accomplishing nothing – particularly for you all, in my humble opinion. You are absolutely unsuited for any kind of education. And in conclusion…

But his class is saved by the bell and they all flee, clearly unscathed by their teacher’s scathing indictment. We get the feeling that the feeling is mutual.

So he’s heading for his new teaching position in Rome, relieved to be finally going to a place that will appreciate his gifts. With him are his nervous wife Agata and his young daughter Caterina. Having burned every bridge, he’s outta there. Narcissistic Giancarlo hasn’t a clue of what he’s done to his daughter, tearing her away from her happy hometown life that she loves and throwing her to the sharks (er, I mean, the teenage girls) in her new city. And now Caterina must make a choice, because as in any good high school clique system, she can’t be friends with everyone. She must pick the group that will define her and do it quick. She’s lucky, after figuring out that she’s not the simpleton that they at first thought she was, everybody sees her potential and wants her.

So what will it be Caterina – the snobby material girls or the sullen artists?

She gives it her best shot with both and both experiences end badly. Her mother is busy trying to placate her crazy husband and her father is busy being crazy, so she’s left to her own devices to try to figure this all out on her own. This is a kind of coming of age movie but in this one it’s the adults that need to make the transition from immaturity to maturity. Caterina has some growing pains and makes some bad choices but I get the feeling that she was never going to turn out a heroin addict or a fascist. She’s a child, but somehow she ended up with a sense of self that have eluded her parents.

What a cast! Sergio Castellito plays the manic Giancarlo in one of my favorites of all of his performances, and Margherita Buy, who I consider Italy’s best modern actress plays the mother on the verge of a nervous breakdown, Agata.

The girls are all such natural actors and Alice Teghil, who plays Caterina, is absolutely perfect – I hope we see much more of her as she grows older. There’s a lot going on in this movie, Roman social commentary, family dynamics, politics – but it’s mostly about Caterina – navigating through the obstacle course that her dad has set up for her – and Alice carries that burden like a seasoned actor.