StunnaKrypto Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Kirpianuscus Bette Davis. and Alberto Sordi. Silvana Mangano . and James Coltrane. and a game with profound implications. one of films who impress first for the cast. than, for the Italian art of bitter comedy. so, an adventure. about dream to become rich. than, for the a character who could not have better interpreter except Bette Davis. because her presence , her voice, her gestures are the pieces who transforms a comedy in a social manifesto. the old economic difference North - South, the different perception about important thing, the fears of each - so different but, in fact, the same. Silvana Mangano as the Meridional wife who leads the house, who impose new step to his husband, making plans and imposing rules. the final is the most inspired solution to a crisis who is only reflection of so many dreams.

albertoveronese A masterpiece from Luigi Comencini. Another masterpiece of an unrestrained cinema that was (for a very long time) inspired and remarkable; Full, alike life... alike a work of art. Luigi Comencini's 'Lo Scopone Scientifico' is entertaining, funny, touching but also sharp, intelligent and intensely sad; it reflects the conditions of many of us: defeat, ignorance and inequality. It's a radiography on how persistent poverty creates a self-perpetuating cycle within the impoverished classes. It speaks of today's democratic societies! Check it out! You'll be amazed how much (today!) you can read out of this movie...Do you know what happens at this very exact time in our history? I'll say it again, check it out, watch this film, you'll know it. Wake up Folks!

Alberto Dirienzi (albertodr07) Fairy tales are usually dark but very rarely are this human or that funny for that matter. Bette Davis plays a wealthy American with an addiction to card playing and to winning. She has become an expert on the local card games of different countries around the world where she owns houses. Bound to a wheel chair, the card games are her only close connection with the world of the living. In Rome, the card game is called "scopone" and she summons a married couple to be her adversaries. The couple, a magnificent Alberto Sordi and an unrecognizable Silvana Mangano, are the poorest of the poor, with a family of five children. As soon as Bette arrives to Rome, she calls them and gives them one million lire to play with. Sistematically, every year she will win the million back. Sordi and Mangano spend the rest of the year practicing, dreaming that one day they will win. The building up to the climax is one of the most painfully funny things I've ever seen. Pathetic and uplifting at the same time. Bette Davis is superb as the capitalist torturer/benefactor with a great Alberto Sordi at her side. Try not to miss it.

claudette-crivelli Horror! The DVD is released without English subtitles. I've been talking about this superb Italian blackish comedy ever since I saw it for the first time. I was puzzled by the fact that such a beautifully made film, brilliantly written and with a cast that includes Bette Davis, Alberto Sordi, Joseph Cotten and Silvana Mangano wasn't some kind of "cult" classic in the States. It isn't because nobody knows about the existence of this jewel. Now, on DVD I hurried to buy as many copies I could find. What a great present for all those folks in the good old USA that have heard me talk about it and imitate Bette Davis saying "I want to play cards" in her death bed. Imagine my shock when I opened the DVDs to find out they didn't include subtitles. I was livid! I rushed back to the shop to return them. The shop manager, in typical Italian style, shrugged his shoulders like saying "What can I do about it" I'm really disappointed by whoever perpetrated this moronic release without any, if nothing else, commercial sense.