Toto, Peppino, and the Hussy

Plot

The brothers Antonio (Totò) and Peppino (Peppino De Filippo) Caponi are boorish landowners living in southern Italy. Antonio is lavish and steals his stingy brother's money. Gianni (Teddy Reno), their sister Lucia (Vittoria Crispo)'s son, is studying medicine in Naples, when he falls in love with Marisa (Dorian Gray), a revue dancer, and follows her to Milan.

The news is broken to the family with an anonymous letter, and the three brothers travel to Milan in an attempt to stop the relationship, which they consider dangerous. Antonio and Peppino try to bribe Marisa away from Gianni but he woos her back by moving her to tears with the song "Malafemmina", and Lucia realizes that she is a good girl. In the end, she leaves the revue world, moves to their village and marries Gianni.

The letter of the Capone brothers

Memorable in the history of comedy films is the scene in the movie where Toto and Peppino (the Capone brothers) have to write a simple letter to be sent to his grandson. Unfortunately for two uneducated peasants and how they use this is almost impossible. In fact, everything that the two brothers should write to his girlfriend's nephew concerns a notice to him to let the boy alone in order to continue his studies. Mistaking it for roughly a prostitute, however, the two brothers write that with 700,000 lire the girl can reward yourself for lost time with their grandson.
Yet Toto, who is believed that most awake, does not realize the severity of grammatical errors that creates the dictate of simple sentences that are anything but pure Italian.
The text of the letter says:

« Signorina veniamo noi con questa mia addirvi una parola che che che scusate se sono poche ma sette cento mila lire; noi ci fanno specie che questanno c’è stato una grande morìa delle vacche come voi ben sapete.: questa moneta servono a che voi vi con l'insalata consolate dai dispiacere che avreta perché dovete lasciare nostro nipote che gli zii che siamo noi medesimo di persona vi mandano questo [la scatola con i soldi] perché il giovanotto è studente che studia che si deve prendere una laura che deve tenere la testa al solito posto cioè sul collo.;.; Salutandovi indistintamente i fratelli Caponi (che siamo noi i Fratelli Caponi) »

Legacy

Some of the most famous scenes of Totò and Peppino took place in this movie (e.g. the dictation of a letter full of grammatical errors and their attempt to talk in French with a Milanese policeman ("nous voulevan savua'...")).

Cast