The Art of Getting Along 1954

Rosario ‘Sasà’ Scimoni, the nephew and unpaid assistant to the mayor of Catania, learns to adapt himself to any man who can help him advance and to any woman he may be able to take advantage of. He moves through political and social landscapes by weaving charm, manipulation, and opportunism, making his own luck in a city that dances between tradition and change.

When he falls for the wife of an honest socialist politician, his ambition takes on a political edge. He engineers the husband’s fall from grace, orchestrating events that land him a prison sentence of five years. By the time the war sweeps Europe, he feigns madness to dodge enlistment, and the First World War passes without him on the battlefield. Afterward, he marries a dim but wealthy heiress and becomes her brother’s indispensable ally in a flour milling business, a position that cements his power in commerce.

As Fascists seize power in Italy, Sasà stays in the game, becoming a vocal activist. Yet he quickly shreds his public insignia after the Allied invasion of Sicily, a moment intensified by the loss of his wife to a bomb. He pivots again, turning to the black market to profit from the chaos. At a beauty pageant, he meets Lilli De Angelis, Armenia Balducci, the winner who dreams of entering films and whose presence rekindles his appetite for influence.

Hearing that movie backers can strike it rich if a project hits, he convinces a dim but wealthy Duca di Lanocita to back a plan. With Lilli as his fiancée, he heads to Rome, riding a wave of public sentiment that shifts from pro-worker to pro-Communist to a Catholic-friendly posture as elections loom. He fancies a film about the workers, then pivots to a saintly project when the Christian Democrats rise to power.

But money is the real currency. The duke insists on moving his capital abroad, so Sasà arranges for a church dignitary to direct funds to foreign missions. The money ends up in Sasà’s hands, allowing him to purchase farmland outside Rome, evict squatters, and bribe officials to secure development rights. When his machinations are exposed, he lands a five-year prison sentence.

On release, he founds his own political party to defend victims of capitalism, a venture that garners little support. The final image lingers on Sasà with his latest companion, dressed in Bavarian attire, as they hawk German razor blades off the back of a lorry—a quiet, unsettling sign of a life built on shifting loyalties and opportunism.