OMICRON (1963)
Article 3097 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 11-12-2009
Posting Date: 2-5-2010
Directed by Ugo Gregoretti
Featuring Renato Salvatori, Rosemary Dexter, Gaetano Quartararo
Country: Italy
What it is: Political science fiction comedy

The dead body of an Italian worker is brought back to life when it is possessed by an alien from outer space. The alien learns to control his new body while exploring the world around him.

I’m really glad I got a chance to see this one, even if my copy is in unsubtitled Italian. I know I’m missing much of the plot, (though I can definitely see that there’s some sort of political subtext) but it gives Renato Salvatori a chance to engage in some truly creative visual comedy, especially when his character is learning how to control his body. The plot appears to revolve around his job, in which he becomes super-competent, but he eventually ends up taking part in a strike. I’d love to figure out what’s going on in some of the scenes, but some of them are quite amusing nonetheless; my favorite has him absorbing the contents of a whole slew of books which he can read just by flipping through the pages (the only book he keeps is an illustrated biography of Brigitte Bardot). The plot becomes more complex as you get deeper into the movie, but even I can tell that it ends with a wicked twist. Let’s hope a good subtitled copy shows up sometime soon.