User Reviews

You recognize the style of Cesare Zavattini's story-telling immediately: the social engagement, in this case the troublesome situation of teachers, who cannot live on their salary, especially not if like here the teacher Vittorio de Sica has four small children and is constantly threatened by his mean landlord to be put out in the street. Miraculously an Indian prince appears, who by accident runs into de Sica and persuades him to be his guide in Rome. The prince is generous, but the problem is that he is totally alien to the Italian mentality and has no idea as how to behave, being totally unrealistic and can't understand anything of the customs and ways of the strange culture of Italy. Nevertheless, he finally rewards Vittorio de Sica with a real elephant, not a baby but yet small enough to be handled, and of course the children love it. This is very much a film for children, it's a wonderful tale of the conflict between the happy carefree world of childhood and a reality that just cannot intrude on it. There are many concerns, after all, what do you do with an elephant in the living-room? - but Vittorio de Sica's unique way of getting out of any trouble mostly by his childish idealism, makes even his wife forgive him..