Francesco, giullare di Dio

The fourth consecutive day of torrential rain today - they don't put that on the postcards. Our regular internet cafe was immediately flooded and shut on day one, and the groovy internet bar I've using in the evenings since didn't seem to bother opening at all yesterday.

So a day of internet-free wet weather activities yesterday: more Discovery of France, Michel Thomas tapes (of whom more another time) and some leisurely cooking.

We're managing to stick to only local ingredients so far without the routine growing stale. The photo above is my regular breakfast: local salami (lots of big bits of soft succulent fat in it), local cheese (maccagno riserva at the moment, a strong soft cheese tasting on the point of being blue) and a fresh focaccia from the deli downstairs. Not much skilled prepartion involved admittedly, but I over-garlicked the lunchtime gnocchi con aglio e olio (e pecorino e basilico) and didn't care to reward it with a photo.

Roberto Rosselini's Francesco, giullare di dio (Francis God's Jester) is vaguely local film - he tells his followers to go off and preach on their own and they ask how they should know where God wants them to go; Francis has them spin around until they're so dizzy they fall over. When he asks them, in turn, in which direction they fell over they reply "Siena", "Florence", "Arezzo", "Pisa", "Spoleto". The Seffalice will be trying this method today at the train station and hoping God points us towards Castelnuovo di Garfagnana as that's where we'll have bought tickets for.

It's an episodic movie (co-scripted by Fellni and made with amateur actors), with little plot as such, but very engaging for all that. It consists of a series of scenes from a short period in St Francis's life, when he gathered his first followers together. I think it's pro-Church or at least pro-Francis, but find it difficult to be sure. The Franciscans are depicted as a bunch of man-child simpletons and Francis in the manner of The Sphinx from Mystery Men. The world outside their commune is worse, however, and is influenced positively by their actions, so I guess I'll have to see some more Rosselini to work it out.

Rather than Francis, the most featured character is the dimmest monk of the lot, Ginepro. He stars in the best episode of the movie in which, having finally been allowed to preach (having been previously restricted to camp) he approaches a band of barbarians besieging a city, led by "the tyrant Nicholas" (played magnificently by Aldo Fabrizi, a 1950s Italian Brian Blessed). After being literally thown between the barbarians (all seemingly in one shot) he's summarily sentenced to death. I couldn't find the scene itself on YouTube but it's worth putting the movie onto a LoveFilm list or similar.It's not too long but be warned, it's a slow one with little action or conventional plot.