FOUR STEPS IN THE CLOUDS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 26, Issue 655, 25 January 1952, Page 22

FOUR STEPS IN THE CLOUDS

(ENIAC. + bs PAOLO is just’ another harassed husband; who stumbles out of bed and can’t switch off the alarm quickly enough, is nagged into putting on the baby’s milk and never hears the last of it if he makes a noise. The light is’ still grey when, his coffee undrunk, he grebs his bag of samples and runs for the bus. Four Steps in the Clouds is the story of how Paolo (in whose shoes Gino Cervi seems quité at home) is led off the chain by .a»country-born girl, Maria (Adriana Benetti), who is. travelling on the same bus. Pregnant, deserted by her lover, Maria is going back home to face the terrible wrath of her peasant parents. When she asks him to go along, just for an hour or two, as her husband, the kind-hearted Paolo is unwilling but in the. end agrees. The hour or two. turn into two days,.with a night under a haystack in between for the troubled and chivalrous stand-in. There is ea great celebration, a humorous midnight conversation between Paolo and Maria’s slightly bibulous grandfather, and a day of the joys of country life (conveyed in part through some quite exquisite photography) in which Paolo and Maria discover a warm friendship. Then the truth comes out. Having cleverly talked Maria’s father all the way into forgiving the girl, Paolo goes back home -afid the © film: ends, almost as it began, with a fallen pot lid shattering the «peace of. the cramped city apartment. Directed by Alessandro Blasetti, this warm, delightful, well-made film is nice blend of humour and pathos. A includes, in a wild bus journey, sta late because the driver has. just. become. a father, and enlivened with: wine ‘apd music, one of the most joyous pieces of cinema I have been lucky enough to see. "