Lord of the Ants (Il signore delle formiche)

LOOSELY BASED ON EVENTS OCCURRED IN ITALY IN THE SIXTIES.

Damn ants, gross.

- Quiet, he'll hear you. - Who?

Can't you see who's over there?

Braibanti, the myrmecologist.

What does that mean?

He studies the life of ants.

He's an expert.

We're leaving in ten minutes.

"On my palm I offered you

a paper boat.

I'd picked it up like a lifeboat

under the soles of boys

pursued by the pre-established order.

You caressed it with a wing,

like a birthday gift.

You looked at me to understand

and there was an immediate exchange,

simple, bright,

like our expectations."

Beautiful.

I wrote it for you.

I wrote one too.

"I thought it was guilt,

it was only courage.

Where infinite is written, I delete it

and I write life.

I thought it was night,

it was only striving.

Where love is written, I delete it

and I write you."

Let's turn in, it's late.

Is it bad verse?

- Who wrote this poem? - I did.

Then I'll tell another one I wrote yesterday.

I remember it well, it goes like this:

"From the top of yonder antique tower

O lonely sparrow, wandering hast gone."

- You wrote that, did you? - Yes, you like it?

- It's beautiful. - "O'er the valleys strays the harmony."

A masterpiece.

LORD OF THE ANTS

Aldo!

Help!

- Shame on you! - Pederast.

IN ROME, WINTER 1965

This wasn't the sum we agreed on.

Single rooms have their costs.

You don't want him to end up in the ward with the others.

He has to feel like he's at home.

Out.

Calm down, I'm here.

Everything's all right.

- What will you do to me? - We want to make you well.

- But I'm not sick. - Of course not.

You're like all the other boys.

Do as I say and you'll soon be out of here.

Where's Aldo?

He's on his way.

Really?

Aldo's the only one who cares about me,

my mother and my brother don't,

they tricked me.

Never mind them, now I'll help you.

Thank you.

But don't tell my mother

that Aldo's coming here.

- She hates him. - Don't worry.

- It's our secret. - Do you promise?

I promise.

Thank you.

What are those machines for?

Never mind.

You'll be asleep soon and you won't feel anything.

Stay calm.

How are you?

The doctors say you're behaving well,

I have faith in the treatment they're giving you.

But medicine isn't enough, you need to eat.

We bring you delicious things and you don't touch them.

The others aren't so lucky.

Look at me.

You know how I suffer when you act like this.

The worst is over,

everything will be like it was before, actually, better.

The priest asked everyone to remember you in the orations.

But you need to pray every day like I do.

Remember the one you said when you were small?

Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom God's love commits me here,

ever this day be at my side to light and guide.

Amen.

Come closer.

Come closer.

Hurry up, I got things to do.

Hurry up, let's make it quick.

Come on.

You really don't wanna do nothin'?

You still gotta pay me.

What do you take me for?

Save your charity for church.

Pay me already, or this is gonna end badly.

IN EMILIA, SPRING 1959

I brought your book back.

I didn't even get halfway through, it got on my nerves.

After "The Time of Indifference” I didn't expect this gratuitous skepticism.

What's so funny?

Skepticism...

One has to know how to read books.

"Contempt" is a novel with a strong point of view,

about the disintegration of illusions.

I shouldn't have given it to you, you don't have the tools,

you can't understand it!

You don't want to admit you can be wrong.

What are you doing here?

Good morning.

I found this one,

it had wings, but it must have lost them on the way here.

It's a Messor structor.

It's excellent it lost its wings.

The foundation of an empire.

She is precisely what was missing,

you can't imagine what a gift this is.

- Who are you? - He's Ettore, my brother.

- You didn't tell me you had a brother. - There was no need.

Let's go, Ettore.

We have to place this treasure in the most important room.

Are you a student?

- Let's say I study medicine. - Why “let's say"?

- It's what my mother wanted. - What would you like to do?

I like drawing, painting.

Why don't you do it?

One should never follow parents' ideas.

They brought us into the world, that should suffice, right?

Come.

Look how beautiful they are.

Don't they suffer behind this glass?

No, they need to be close together,

even in a boundless countryside, always.

You know why?

If an ant is left alone, it loses its way home.

He lent me a book on Piero della Francesca.

And you?

Nothing.

I'm not in the mood to read.

Why didn't you tell me you came here?

I would have come too, it's a neat place.

Braibanti seems nice,

easygoing.

Aldo's no good for you,

he's only interested in throwing you into a crisis

whether he says you're right or wrong.

You're too touchy.

I'm not touchy.

Anyway, it's done now, he won't leave you in peace.

Especially after you gave him that ant...

You've searched for heaps of ants for him,

this one just appeared in front of me.

How was I to know it was the queen?

Don't you go back there, it's your first and last time.

Where's the harm in it?

This way we can do something together.

We're brothers.

"Virgin mother,

daughter of thy Son,

humble and high beyond all other creatures,

the limit fixed of the eternal counsel.

Lady, thou art so great and so prevailing,

that he who wishes grace, nor runs to thee,

his aspirations without wings would fly."

Good job.

Bravo.

Enjoy your children, this is the best age,

then they grow up.

Remember all the poems Dad taught you?

I never had the patience.

Whereas your sister does nothing else,

she teaches him one a week as if they were girls.

- What do you know? - Forget it.

No reading at the table!

What's all this ruckus?

Enough!

Don't ruin the book, it's Professor Braibanti's.

That one lends books, but with other intentions.

They used to have those like him interned.

And they were right.

Who are you talking about, Susanna's son?

None other,

the police found him in the countryside

doing... never mind.

Is the cake good?

It's insanely good.

I made it myself.

The female, the queen,

always mates with many males

and keeps their sperm all her life.

After she has mated she loses her wings,

she digs a hole in the ground

and fertilizes the eggs with the sperm she has collected.

Do you know what I like about ants?

What?