Alfredo!
Wait, don't run!
I'll tell Mom you left me behind!
Wait!
THE ART OF HAPPINESS
They say the soul always finds its way home again,
no matter how long it's been or if the time is right,
the soul returns.
But I wonder:
what is its home?
This city?
These people? Are we really the home of the soul?
Or rather its cage?
And these thoughts running through our heads
are perhaps its chains.
Hey! What's to look at?
Never seen a girl cry before?
Yeah, sure.
And so?
So, what?
What? Why don't you get moving?
You still haven't said where you want to go!
That's because...
I don't know.
And so?
Take me away from here.
And turn off that radio, please!
I'll just turn it down, that's all.
- Okay then, do it. - Done.
- Good. - Thanks.
We're in the trash!
It's disgraceful,
it's disgusting!
You've deserted us.
I'm sorry.
I mean, I'm sorry for before.
You can turn up the volume, I really don't mind.
Want my opinion on the soul? It never ages,
and that's the rip-off,
at a certain age you're still eager, you're wired,
but you have to kick the bucket to start over.
We're in the wheel of life, in Samsara,
in the vicious circle of death and rebirth,
we've been in it for centuries and can't get out,
always the same recycled souls
in thousands of different trash bags,
we live and get scrapped thousands of times.
If we could at least remember what we've already been!
Do you think...
there's really another life, another chance?
Where?
What kind of question's that?
Sorry, I was lost in thought.
The radio, the mark on your neck... it's all so surreal.
What's the radio got to do with my mark and my question?
- Nothing, exactly... - Exactly what?
Listen, I'll be frank with you,
I'm having a tough period, I got a bit lost.
- Oh, that's just great! - No, I know where we are...
I understand, don't worry.
I have an idea, take me someplace you like,
a place that brings back memories to you.
You really have no destination?
My head's in a big muddle
and a huge void.
That makes two of us.
I'll take the lead.
It's 5 p.m. at the Art of Happiness and I say the time's gone
for the ordinary,
for the come and go of days, without change.
That's it: the days are our cage!
The time has come to free the soul from the blatancy of living.
What is this building? It looks ancient.
I've never known, my grandparents lived nearby.
- You never asked what it was? - I don't even care.
My grandmother would watch us from that window up there.
My brother and I would play down here,
he'd tell me scary stories,
he loved to frighten me.
Do you remember any?
The little brother started running,
never looking back, and that's what saved him.
But ever since then the big brother's ghost
haunts him, because he abandoned him.
What was the little brother's name?
Sergio, just like you.
That's not true, it's impossible, you're a liar!
Liar, liar!
- And then? - And then, what?
- Never mind... Next stop? - Do I always have to decide?
- It's your car. - But it's your run.
I'd rather be driven around, I've already made too many mistakes.
- Let's go to the beach! - I don't have a swimsuit.
Then wait here, I'll take a quick dip in my memories and be back.
Okay, but don't leave me alone too long,
when I feel alone, I get unbearable.
I noficed!
- I was tempted not to come. - I know.
Have you got your violin at least?
So you won't be too rusty if you decide to come back.
I'm not coming back, Sergio.
Why are you always so drastic?
You're a real asshole! You like being dramatic, right?
You like scaring me, you have since we were kids.
Please don't ever stop playing!
You know I don't like playing alone, it makes me sad.
There are lots of musicians, even better than me,
so don't look for excuses and don't be a crybaby.
You're an asshole,
this trip makes no sense, go back home.
If you take Uncle Luciano’s cab, I'll get pissed.
Don't throw your talent away, little brother.
It's my life, I'll do what I want with it.
- Back again? - Who?
Who? You, sir... I mean, you!
You said 'a quick dip', but you monopolized my run.
So, where can I take you to make amends?
- No, I'll walk. - Where will you go?
- Scared you won't see me again? - No...
I mean, I didn't mean to pry.
You won't like what I'm about to say.
- You're going to cry again? - Maybe.
I must have left my wallet at home.
I'll drive you there.
I'll never set foot in that house again.
- Then the run is on me. - No...
- I'll leave you my address. - No, it's on me.
No...
Wait, I have an idea!
Here, take this.
- But... - Don't say a word!
- Good God, I can't take this. - Please.
- Just your name. - Sergio.
I'm Antonia. We'll meet again, won't we?
Yes, I'm sure we will!
It's exactly 6 p.m. at The Art of Happiness
and here's my thought of the moment:
if we've already lived a thousand lives,
if we've been in the world so long,
then we've all known one another for ages.
If we've always filled this world, let's wake up,
let's be happy, let's hug...
before the Apocalypse wipes us out.
Yesterday I heard from that recording company again,
they said we just need to find a good drummer
or they'll get us one.
We're on the right road, Alfredo!
Maybe I've found a place in Dharamsala for a few months,
I mean, Uncle Luciano has.
A friend of his from the 1970s moved there...
What's all this? Dharamsala?
I didn't say anything, I was undecided.
Still this fucking idea of being a guru in India?
A guru? No way.
It's not easy to explain,
but it's important to me,
so let me talk, don't jump on me.
Sergio, I'm trying to communicate to you!
But I need to make music,
I need good music around me, but you're giving me bad vibs.
Shut up! Good music is just the music you like?
Right, right!
Then hear this:
if an ear for music means being deaf to everything else,
then I'm through with music!
So, she said: "I'll leave you my address"
and you said: "Don't worry"?
Why? Think she was hooking for me?
"Hooking for me"... What talk! She was flirting!
Where's your head, Big Serge?
You know where, Nando.
Sure, sorry, it must be tough, I know,
but I got caught up in the story of the ring,
if only I had a chance like that!
- But aren't you married? - Yes.
But it was my only chance, I couldn't let her get away!
Calabritto Street, at the corner of Vittoria Square.
I'll take it, I'm three minutes away.
Bye Big Serge, and listen, go back home,
you really look done in.
- Spend some time with the family. - No way in the world.
I say, your decision never to leave that taxi
is idiotic.
If they find out you work non-stop, they'll take your taxi license.
I haven't decided anything, what happens, happens.
- If they take your driving license? - So what!
You did it, I can't believe it!
- What? - You took Uncle Luciano's taxi.
- I said I would. - What an idiot!
Look at you! What the hell are you wearing?
So, now you're a cab driver. And music?
- It's in my soul. - Then I'm with you.
If you were, we'd be playing, I wouldn't be a cab driver
and you wouldn't be a fucking Buddhist.
Drop it! You're like a hammer on an anvil!
You're like a mule, a rock,
you're stubbornness personified,
you won't change nor accept changes.
- And what are you like? - Me? I'm like water.
I take the form of a receptacle, I'm not the receptacle itself,
I'm decantable, changeable,
I'm flowing water, shiny, limpid, shapeless, iridescent.
You're stagnant water, a piss-pot,
sewer water, toad's sputum.
What sleaze together, if I'd stayed.
Wrong, you and I were like communicating vessels.
What you took for yourself, you took from me.
You disappoint me,
in the communicating vessel theory,
water redistributes itself in equal measure between the two vessels.
That's okay, but what if you overflow?
Sergio, you and I are linked,
I don't know if by water, piss or blood,
but our happiness is in just one vessel.
So try to do what makes you happy, I say this for me.
I'll try, big brother,
but try to feel like shit there, because I miss you here.
You're such a mule, a lost cause!
What's that on TV, Lucia? Are you nuts?
Change channels, the championship's on!
Shut up, they're saying something important.
How do you know? Do you understand French?
It's English, you dimwit, besides there are subtitles.
- Put the game on! - No.
- Turn to the game! - No.
- Put the damned game on! - I said no!
Mom, hi.
Yes, I'm still in the cab.
Of course I remember, what question is that?
No, I don't want to sleep.
No, don't put him on.
I don't want to see any family
besides you know, holding it in church is hypocritical crap,
it's a farce, it makes no sense.
C'mon, Mom, don't cry.
Okay, CW,
you're right, cry.
No, I'll sleep in the cab.
Bye.
Man is suffered happiness,
he's dawning travail,
he's continuous struggle to live surviving,
he's basic transformation which, for light,
generates the passage through darkness.
Pain becomes more unbearable,
because we're unprepared to tell ourselves the truth.
And when it happens, and it does, it's part of our heritage,
coming to terms with it is part of our lives,
then we feel defeated and we ask: why?
When we face the drama of loved ones
being taken from us by death,
we find...
we, who were not personally hit by suffering,
find alibis to the questions we should be asking ourselves.
"He died because he had cancer", we say.
"Because he was old, because he was there, not elsewhere."
When we should have said clearly:
"He died because he was born".
By now it's like a mother-tongue to me,
I earn as an interpreter and do documentaries too.
Listen, this is Nagarjuna:
"if this life is more fragile than a bubble on water,
isn't it miraculous that, after having slept,
to wake up nice and lively and breathe in..."
Nice and lively?
It's 6:30 a.m., I've been off duty for two hours
and I'm not used to seeing your dumb face when I wake up,
it's a traumatic experience.
Right, your childhood must have really been rotten!
Get emotionally prepared though, I'll call again this afternoon,
your afternoon, if you have no other commitments!
Say hello to the folks, take care of them, okay?
- A big hug, Tubby! - Oh sure. Bye!
- Uncle Luciano! - I know, no smoking in taxis.
- How did you do it? - You forgot to lock.
Eyes on the road!
If you ruin my old Mercedes, you'll really get it!
Hear how that engine still purrs.
- Where to? - Just away from here.
The moldy smell in churches, not to mention the incense,
sets my nerves on edge!
How could the Lord's house be made so inhospitable?
Such a grim place, with all those distressing images.
How can a lost sheep
find himself in all that Baroque frippery?
Don't listen to me, I'm a sinner.
I don't feel so guilty with you here.
No one's guilty around here, get off it,
not even your folks.
They knew.
They respected Alfredo's wishes,
you can't humiliate them for that.
You'll always be little Sergy, the last to arrive.
The last to know things.
How sharp you were as a kid, how beautiful you both were!
- Are those photographs? - Yes.
Give them here, I want to see them.
Recently he'd stopped contacting me on Skype.
"There's no line here", he'd say,
"but it's best like that,
I just miss your dumb face."
But he wasn't well at all!
He didn't want to show himself
and I didn't suspect a thing.
Now my memories are all wrong,
all these letters should be re-read and corrected,
all my words and thoughts for ten years.
No way your memories are all wrong.
Look, both of you in your uncle's arms.
I was cool, wasn't I?
Anyway, I got even better with age.
Uncle Luciano, have you ever cried?
Of course! When you were born, for example.
- Lord, how I cried! - I mean...
Have you ever been sad enough to cry?
Several years ago, when they elected that Premier.
Today is Alfredo's funeral, but you're so calm,
almost like you didn't care.
I was there when you both were born,
that night when we almost lost you to a fever
and when Alfredo had his motorbike accident.
And he was at my house the first time he played hooky, and you too,
and the day of his divorce too
and your degrees in Philosophy.
I saw you as tots, as kids,
then you came back to me with whiskers.
You died and were reborn a thousand times before my eyes
and I thought a thousand times:
these are my old, new nephews.
And now look at you, with wrinkles,
still instigating me, like when you were a kid,
because you want me to reveal the secret of life and smiles.
Why don't you?
Because it's a secret.
But it's not my secret, Sergio,
we're all its keepers.
And because you and I have always understood one another,
let's leave the gloomy faces to the others.
52 Petrarca Street, next to the post office.
It's right around the corner, why don't you take it?
- And you? - Drop me here.
- I've been wandering for three days. - Meaning?
- I haven't been home. - Where do you sleep?
Rooming houses, hotels... top notch ones, of course.
But we'll get over it, Sergy.
52 Petrarca Street, next to the post office.
- Go! - Yeah.
Okay, I'll take it, 5 minutes.
Uncle Luciano,
I don't remember who I am anymore.
What do you mean you don't remember?
It's like asking: excuse me, do you remember what time it is?
We're here, we're now, we're what we can do best.
What I can do best is remembering.
I'm obsessed by memories, but they're all that's left.
Really?
Then flush them down the toilet
and let's see if there's really nothing left of you.
Uncle Luciano,
who taught you to live so in peace with your memories?
I don't remember,
maybe my arteriosclerosis.
Refuse accumulation continues in Campania,
recycling struggles at below 30%,
there are no functioning compost sites
and nothing has been done for long-term waste disposal.
Dump sites are the poisoned results of decrees
enacted in the fury of emergencies.
We move on with waivers and promises, yet I say: "We're the vanguard".
Our stench crosses the ocean and makes the world's papers,
we're trash for exportation, the greasy soul of the third millennium.
You can pretend to ignore it,
you snobs might kill us, but it would serve little.
We're just the vanguard.
I understand the emergency situation,
but do you think you should take it home with you?
I wanted to be a good example, a small personal contribution.
Kidding aside, if you allow,
what are these bags, Christmas gifts?
My dear cabby, this is real trash!
- Would you like me to pull over? - Are you joking?
With all the time it took me to gather it!
This, let's just say, is my recycling.
You've no idea what people throw out!
In other words, this is your field?
- Not exactly, I'll tell you. - Good.
Time ago, I inherited a small piece of land used as a junk yard,
a car demolition plant near Agnano.
I tried to continue the activity, but business got worse and worse,
until I couldn't pay the rent
and I had to move into the junk yard.
My darkest period had begun.
Then one night, I heard noises,
I took a gun and ran outside.
There was a guy with a bag rummaging through my junk.
"Hands up, you SOB, I'm calling the police".
He begged me: "No police!"
He was shaking, looked like he hadn't eaten for a while.
"Where are you from?", I asked. "American."
"And with all the money you have in America,
you're stealing from a Neapolitan junk dealer?"
He said he wasn't a thief, he was a recycling artist.
Anyway, he had more problems than me,
I gave him some left-overs,
then he took me to see his shack.
There were thousands of metal sculptures,
assemblages of old metal scraps,
among which was a beautiful, big, colorful bird.
I looked at it and said: "This is the phoenix,
it's beauty rising from the world's ashes".
In an instant I understood
the hidden wealth of everyday things,
all you do is rearrange them, give them new form.
In short, I became his agent.
I even helped him with the welding.
My junk yard became his laboratory,
things started going so well,
that in a couple of years we even had a showing in Manhattan.
It was a huge success!
That evening our wallets were full,
we had a glass of Prosecco in hand
and finally dressed to a T.
I took his arm and said:
"They wanted to trash us...
but look here!"
Now he has returned to his country,
he owns an apartment in downtown Manhattan.
So, why are you still in this city?
Because I dream of seeing it rise from the ashes
or because I like it just the way it is.
People always look for new things and throw out the old,
but if that were happiness, we'd soon be broke and buried in trash!
So, I sell back what's thrown out,
that's my happiness:
giving new form to old things.
Good for you.
Good grief, I couldn't stand that ceremony any longer!
- May I? - Of course.
- Of course not, Mrs. Pinotta! - Shut up, Lariza!
Pass me my lighter.
They wouldn't let me smoke even one cigarette.
But lady Francesca was adamant.
Don't irritate me, you and my daughters. All health freaks!
I don't want to die in good health... it would be a sin, right?
How old are you, 40?
- 43. - And you smoke?
A young man like you, with your whole life ahead.
I don't really care if the end comes for me,
everything's become such crap.
But now these problems are your generation's.
At your age, we didn't kowtow like you guys.
It might not seem so now,
but my husband and I rose from poverty.
What a man my husband was,
a tireless worker!
In fact, he amassed great wealth
and passed on before he could enjoy it.
I used to say: "Why earn so much,
if you can't enjoy what you earn?"
He'd say: "I do it for you, my love".
He was so sweet!
He left me alone, that dimwit, alone and rich!
Who would want a 50-year-old woman?
Francesca says you had lots of beaus!
Shut up, Lariza!
My daughter is naive.
All they wanted was my money,
but money is all that's left to me of my husband,
I'm not giving it to them!
Because you're a tightwad, an old tightwad!
Shut up, you're ugly and you cost me a fortune!
I didn't need a nursemaid, it was my daughter's obsession.
Anyway, at your age,
my husband and I had so many plans,
everyone did,
then we achieved them and the world became a dung-heap.
Maybe that's why the youth want to do fuck-all!
- Mrs. Pinotta! - I used a bad word, huh?
But he'll forgive me, the youth say lots, right?
Good for you, at least you let off steam.
This taxi is a mess, you need a housecleaner.
Take Lariza, so I can get rid of her!
And all these little statues... are you a Buddhist?
No, my brother.
I wish I'd had a brother,
even a Buddhist would be okay.
Unfortunately I'm an only child, it's my regret.
Growing up alone
is like playing volleyball against a wall.
You're lucky.
It's 5:32 at The Art of Happiness
and a soul is calling us from afar, maybe from a previous life.
We left it too far behind us.
And when suddenly we hear its voice,
no matter if it's a bad day, or if we're sad or pissed off,
we've found it again and this means just one thing,
that the sense of things is returning
and we'll go back to understanding.
But the point is:
will we like what we understand?
There's another woman, isn't there?
There's no other woman.
- Tell me, she's younger than me. - She's not.
So, there is one!
She's not younger than you because there is no other woman, Erika.
Are you screwing around with me?
You say is over between us and then you make fun of me?
Do I look like I'm having fun?
Look, what happened to you isn't my fault.
Exactly.
You're going through a rough time, I understand, you're confused.
I'm confused because I see clearly.
These are the words of a confused man.
Erika, what do you want?
- Why are you still here? - I want to understand.
Those who want to understand are silent, try it.
Normal people ask questions when they want to understand!
Fuck off, Sergio, you're a real asshole!
They ask questions...
They ask people who are more confused than they are.
I'd reply more willingly to a 'fuck off'.
And now that affections have gone to hell, let's see what's left.
His eyes were far away
with his celebrity.
Don't place any expectations,
is the best of situations
to avoid disappointment.
But hope is always lurking
and he pushed me like a jerking
returning me to my pain.
We're all in the same life,
but in your hands mine suffers only strife.
Beyond the words are eyes of stone
to throw at the moon offended and betrayed.
You come here, confiding things important to you,
to tell me your stories, your dramas
and then you go! So I say:
who the fuck are you? Damned souls, ghosts?
Think I'm your mirror, a priest?
Did you wonder who I am?
I don't give a damn about your stories,
if then you go your own fucking way?
Why do you tell me your business,
and leave me in this crap taxi,
wandering around for a hundred years?
Fuck off to those who vent themselves with me, but don't give shit for me!
Fuck off to those who tend their damned little gardens
and then spout off about our sick humanity,
you are that sick humanity!
You piss everyday in your toilet to mark your territory,
complaining about what people, your country and the world don't give you.
You put the family above all things,
as if the family was a virtue!
You don't like string-pullers, but if it's for your kids,
you'd even kill!
I spit on your kids who give you so much worry,
because they'll grow up worse than you, thanks to you!
Fuck off to those who look at me as if I were a puppet,
mannequin, a cartoon,
without seeing that behind the mask is a man,
with something to say, something in his soul!
And fuck off to you too, Alfredo.
Fuck off to those who go off to die alone, far from sight.
And now music,
I want music.
The plan of the Civil Protection Agency for Vesuvius
is based on the prediction that devastating eruptions might re-occur:
the most recent being in 1631, in 472
or the one in 79 AD which destroyed Pompei, Herculaneum and Stabia.
The situation today is similar to that which preceded those events,
the eruptions...
"And the temple of God was opened in Heaven
and the ark of his testament was seen in his temple,
and there was lightning, and voices,
and an earthquake and great hail."
Think I'll be impressed by the Apocalypse of John?
- You should. - Why?
Because it's not far now,
the countdown has begun.
It might not be Vesuvius, maybe not even the Mayan prophecy
about the end of the world in 2012,
but the end is near.
Do you really think the Apocalypse is near?
Listen, I remember you.
You were in the big time until a few years ago.
You and your brother, if I'm not mistaken.
You were great, stuff that really moved you.
And now you're just an ordinary cab driver in a crap city,
a mister nobody.
And it worked out okay for you.
There are people with talent begging on the streets.
Or locked at home feeling sorry for themselves
or licking some old prof's ass, hoping he'll croak.
But here the old guys hang on to power even when they croak,
they're incredible! This is an old people's world,
a handful of avid old men scattered throughout the world
have all the capital, all the power,
they don't have a fucking idea about the future of humanity
and they don't give a damn.
We have to wake up, I say!
But we won't because it's too late.
I know you too.
You're the guy on the radio, "The Art of Happiness",
a lover of contradictions.
No, no contradiction.
I'm just trying to understand
if we can be happy even without a future.
Can we?
Can we be happy with the thought that after you, no one will smile?
People have lost hope,
they're resigned,
convinced that tomorrow will be worse than today.
They talk as if it wasn't their problem,
as if the future didn't belong to them.
And it's true, the road is straight and runs right to the abyss.
Who of us, individually, can change things?
Who can change the course? Me, you?
Maybe those old rich guys,
but they're rolling in dough, they don't want a revolution,
they'd shoot into the crowd to leave things as they are,
actually, they'd pay someone to.
They don't even want to dirty their hands.
Won't someone eventually rebel?
Only if someone else turns his TV off.
And so?
How does the last episode on humanity end up?
Like this:
we'll be watching TV in our golden cage
and unhappiness will seize us,
and it will be too late to understand why,
because unhappiness
has no reasons, no causes,
it has nothing to say!
So, rather than die one at a time, envying those who have lived longer,
we'll prefer to die altogether of the same disease.
Maybe we'll end it all with fireworks,
naked, with a glass of champagne, as the sky falls down
and anxiety, desperation find no room in our souls,
because our mission on Earth is over, you see?
We'll let ourselves die in peace
and if everything comes from on high, we wouldn't feel guilty
for not having done anything to change things.
Sorry!
I thought I was a pessimist.
You almost convinced me, you know?
What's missing to convince you totally?
I'm missing a precise idea of the future, like yours maybe.
Then maybe our salvation is in what you're missing.
As long as musicians stay in their taxis,
and poets wait on table,
as long as better men work on the payroll for worse men,
the road runs straight towards the Apocalypse.
Oh...
I remembered, Sergio Cometa, right?
Right.
I'll be waiting on the air for you,
with a couple of new pieces, maybe.
Maybe.
No matter how long it's been or if the time is right.
Hear how that engine still purrs!
That's my happiness, giving new form to old things.
Our happiness is in just one vessel,
so try to do what makes you happy, I say this for me.
If that were happiness, we'd soon be broke and buried in trash!
So, now you're a cab driver.
And now you're just an ordinary cab driver in a crap city,
a mister nobody.
Sergio, you're like a mule, a rock,
you're stubbornness personified!
You won't change nor accept changes.
Fuck off, Sergio, you're a real asshole!
How sharp you were as a kid!
Your childhood must have really been rotten!
Eyes on the road!
The road is straight and runs right to the abyss.
I don't really care if the end comes for me.
We have to wake up, I say,
but we won't.
Say hello to the folks, take care of them, okay?
We reach a level of insomnia, of pondering, of historical sense,
in which the living being is injured and dies,
it's the same for a man, a people or a civilization.
Did you feel that too?
Yes.
- What the devil was it? - I don't know, get me out of here!
Hello, and so?
The only difficulties in getting into a young new world
can be of a personal nature.
Naivety, sensitivity, imagination
are finally tolerated.
Enhance your range of emotions,
up-grading of your individual freedom,
extension of psychic abilities,
everything now depends on your willpower.
Hang on tight!
Turn right.
- Alfredo! - Get into that alley!
- But what... - There, there!
Alfredo, where the fuck did you bring me?
Goddammit!
Alfredo!
Thank God!
We didn't know what that sound was!
Sorry, I fell asleep.
He says he fell asleep,
with his head on the horn, the craziest thing!
You scared us to death!
We see a guy with his head on the wheel, he's not moving,
we think he's dead.
Anyway, is everything okay? Are you alright?
Yes, just fine.
You're sure? You look like a car ran you down.
I'm fine, I've just got a backlog of sleep.
He's fine,
he's just got a backlog of sleep.
Then, we'll leave,
but go get some sleep at home please.
You father said you'd be by sooner or later.
- But I'd given up hope. - Sorry, Mom.
Don't even say that!
Good grief, you're drenched,
come in.
I'd rather not, I can't bear seeing all the relatives.
- Should I get your father? - Yes, please.
Bye, Sergy, will you drop by again soon?
Yes. Bye, Mom.
What are you reading, Alfredo?
A book.
- What's written in it? - That you're a dimwit.
You're a fink.
He and I understood one another more,
we were similar.
Besides, I was a kid when he was born, we grew up together.
You're my son, you're another generation,
he was...
a friend.
Keeping it from you wasn't your mother's fault...
It doesn't matter, Dad, it's behind us.
It's important for me to tell you,
I understand you, you must have thought I was distant,
as if I had no consideration for you,
but the point is, you awed me,
that's something I'm not familiar with.
You're more than what I gave you,
more than what I know.
Maybe sometimes you thought I was distrustful,
but that's not true,
I admired you for what you were,
but it wasn't because of me,
understand?
I understand everything, Dad.
But the rain doesn't stop falling.
I understand your speeches.
You're all so logical,
reasonable.
"I agree..."
"Of course..."
"But it must be considered that..."
"Life is like that,
like this..."
Good for you all!
You're all so close to the truth
that the reality of your words isn't an inch off base.
But the point is
your words don't move reality by even one inch!
I love lies and bullshit more,
clowns, swindlers, children's fairytales,
fly-by-night promises.
I love those who don't conform, who can't stand your truisms.
Because I don't want to belong, I didn't vote for this reality.
I want to think things that have never been thought,
live things never lived, see things never seen.
I want music, the right music at the right time.
I want the impossible, the improbable.
I want a girl with short hair that I saw for just a moment.
I want her now, here, where I met her!
Hear me? I want you!
I don't give a damn if it makes no sense!
Where the fuck are you, Antonia?
You should be here where my thoughts are.
Alfredo!
Where the fuck are you?
"Beloved Sergio,
it was tough deciding to write this letter,
face the weight of a farewell.
But last night I thought:
a farewell is just like death, the old lady,
once you take her name and kingdom, what's left of her?
Just a scythe in no-man's land.
It's hard to tell you how I've been hating words recently,
they're like traps, but I owe them to you.
When you read this, you'll already know the reasons for my death
and you'll wonder what sense there was in this big lie.
You'll think I'm crazy,
that I'm an asshole.
Then maybe you'll be convinced I did it to make you suffer less,
but you still won't be able to forgive me.
You'll hate me, in your own way.
But the truth is different,
because the lie is different.
The lie is that I'm ill.
The lie is the way our folks looked at me
when we got the news ten years ago.
The lie is that happiness was behind them
and that now they had to take care of a sick son.
But I managed to hold my ground, not to let them convince me,
actually, to convince them of the opposite.
But it wouldn't have been so easy with you, damn you!
If I think of how you looked at me,
with all your demands, the expectations you had in me.
If I think of your beautiful blue eyes,
such sweetness,
they're my Joy-
I never could have resisted before your weepy childish eyes.
You'd have convinced me, Sergio.
I know you won't believe me,
but there's no illness at all in me,
there never has been.
I eat, drink, crap,
I sleep, laugh, dream, hope.
I die.
I'm happy-
Thoughts are made of the same stuff as dreams,
a happy thought is worth the same as a sad one.
Sadness is cheap, but happiness too costs nothing.
So, what do you choose?
When I rummage in the past I find pain and death,
when I look to the future, stress and illusions,
but when I rummage in the present
I find this present,
this moment, from which I'm writing you now,
from which you are reading now.
This infinite present,
so bright.
And there's always music, you're there,
your eyes,
there's Uncle Luciano smiling.
Stop going in circles, Sergio.
Go back to looking for your best notes.
Till the next time, little brother.
I love you.
Alfredo."
- Do I have to wait much longer? - I waited all night for you.
- Why? - Why? Because you weren't here!
I came this morning to get my things.
- Are you leaving? - For where?
- How do I know! - Then open the trunk.
Right away.
Wait, I'll help you load your bags.
No, wait, take this first.
- This? - Yes.
It's 8:30 at the Art of Happiness on a splendid December morning.
The air is curiously scented, the sky is crystal clear, the city...
my city, is beautiful,
just like hope.
Here's a piece I found while going through my archive,
it's a recording about ten years old:
two brothers, a piano, a violin,
who'll go different ways,
but here they're still together.
And they say there's no poetry!
And it's all inside me and then I realize I have no words.
There's no poetry, just melancholy and the blues.
And I stay here between my hands and the rest of the pain.
And I stay here between my hands and a contradiction.
I'll go along
against the wind,
I'll be gone
in a moment...
THE ART OF HAPPINESS
translation Charlotte Lantery
subtitles Ombre elettriche - Roma