Audiences may not expect I Can Quit Whenever I Want (Smetto quando voglio) to commence with The Offspring’s 1998 single Why Don’t You Get a Job?, just as they might be surprised by the class-skewering take on Breaking Bad that follows – but that’s just what the equally dark and daft Italian comedy offers. Setting a somewhat silly tone from the outset with its anachronistic song selection, the film probes European society’s new strata of over-educated, under-employed as it amusingly steps through the get-rich-quick solution du jour: starting a drug empire.
Molecular researcher Pietro Zinni (Edoardo Leo, Blame Freud) is introduced at his lowest point, after lying to his wife, Guilia (Valeria Solarino, The Audition about losing his university job. To make ends meet, he is reduced to chasing a student who owes him money for tutoring, ending up drugged in a nightclub. When his dismay subsides, he realises the possibility of his predicament as well as the profit to be made, plotting to use his field of study to create a new type of party favour. Capitalising on a loophole in the classification of illicit substances, his new concoction falls on the right side of the law – but as his business grows, police attention is not the only unfortunate side effect.
The now-infamous US television show about a teacher taking to methamphetamine production and turning bad might be the obvious starting point and inspiration for I Can Quit Whenever I Want; however basic narrative components are where the bulk of parallels end. Though comparably reacting to a tepid economic climate that forces ordinary citizens into extraordinary choices simply to survive, first-time feature writer/director Sydney Sibilia and co-scribes Valerio Attanasio (The Salt of Life) and Andrea Garello (Italian TV’s Il commissario Manara) mine the humour, not the horror, of the situation, playing the scenario for laughs wherever they can.
Resting the film’s take on unremarkable everymen provides the crux of the hilarity, as Pietro – as performed by a suitably frenzied Leo – is joined in his escapades by a troupe of similarly downtrodden would-be professors. A capable supporting cast of Valerio Aprea (Escort in Love), Paolo Calabresi (Nothing Can Stop Us Now), Libero De Rienzo (Honey) and Stefano Fresi (Viva l’Italia) furnish this band of merry sidekicks simply wanting their own modest lot in life. Of course, in lively, broad portrayals, the ensemble becomes seduced by the trappings of their new lifestyle.
With a swift pace, smatterings of a smart wit, and a willingness to both satirise and dwell in silliness where needed, Sibilia also shows signs of several other sources of influence, from classic Italian efforts to the burgeoning crime caper genre. Seminal offering Big Deal on Madonna Street provides a clear predecessor for both the bungling amusement and the societal statement on display, while the early works of Guy Ritchie (Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, for example) inform the feature’s saturated aesthetic and breezy, free-wheeling style. An imbalance of outlandishness and commentary renders the finished product as slighter than its forebears, but modest entertainment still emanates. The title of I Can Quit Whenever I Want may radiate irony, yet the feature itself also shows empathy, finding a relatable core in its raucous comedy of circumstance.
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
I Can Quit Whenever I Want (Smetto quando voglio)
Director: Sydney Sibilia
Italy, 2014, 100 mins
Italian Film Festival 2014
www.italianfilmfestival.com.au
Melbourne: 17 September – 12 October
Sydney: 18 September – 12 October
Canberra: 23 September – 15 October
Perth: 24 September – 15 October
Brisbane: 1 – 22 October
Adelaide: 2 – 22 October
Byron Bay: 9 – 15 October
Hobart: 16 – 22 October
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