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Federico Fellini invites us to hang out with a group of unemployed, lazy twentysomethings in 1953's I vitelloni, one of his earliest films and an interesting portrait of life in a sleepy Italian town. For Jos\xe9, comparisons to his youth in a sleepy Spanish town abound; Mike finds links to British films that evoke similar feelings. I vitelloni is both culturally specific and universally relatable - every society has some version of the gang one grows up with, and the middle-class youngsters who think they rule the place.\n\nWe consider the motif of homosexuality - evoked in different ways by different characters, sometimes explicitly and sometimes only if we want to see it, but present throughout - and the theme of patriarchy, considering particularly the roles of women in the film, be they wives, mothers, or playthings, and ask what their agency is, if any - do they even believe they have any? Life in I vitelloni's seaside town is unconducive to personal progress, development, opportunity, and freedom, but where another story would express the frustrations felt by the constricted youth, here they harbour few ambitions.\n\nI vitelloni is evocative and timeless - as coherent and understandable today as it was seventy years ago.\n\nRecorded on 14th May 2020.