November Movie of the Month: It Started in Naples (1960)

This month, it’s Clark Gable and Sophia Loren romping around the beautiful Capri scenery in It Started in Naples.

Clark is Mike Hamilton, a Philadelphia lawyer who travels to Rome to settle the estate of his estranged brother who drowned. He is shocked to learn that he has a nephew–an impressionable, unruly eight-year-old boy named Nando (Marietto), who is being cared for by his mother’s sister, Lucia (Loren). At first Mike tries to give Lucia some money and head back to America, but as he gets to know Lucia and Nando, he decides to stick around. Lucia works as a maid and cook during the day and as a nightclub singer at night. Nando doesn’t attend school and roams the streets barefoot, passing out nightclub flyers and smoking cigarettes. Mike decides Nando would be better off in America with him, a decision not welcomed by Lucia. After his lawyer suggests to both of them that they “make nice” to settle the matter out of court, they fall in love.

Our Italian tale begins with Clark’s narration–his lovely, silky voice telling us his reason for traveling to Italy from America:

“This is bella Napoli–beautiful Naples.  I was here once before, with the Fifth Army during the War. The Neapolitans cheered us all the way from the beach. Half an hour later they were selling our gasoline on the black market. And those kids on the street–scrounging cigarettes, swiping K rations–for a while in this town, Spam took the place of spaghetti. I’m just coming back to settle my brother’s estate–with any luck I’ll be out of here without even drinking the water!”

This is Clark’s second-to-last film and he looks 100% healthier here than he does in his final film, The Misfits. Tanned, silvery hair and a little plumper from a bit too much Italian pasta, he looks pretty good.

Clark’s character is at first not enchanted by beautiful Capri–not one bit. From putting his wallet in his interior jacket pocket to refusing to drink from a water fountain and brushing his teeth with liqour to threatening everyone trying to grab his suitcase–he’s hardly swept up in the charms of Italy.

The scenes between Clark and his little nephew Marrietto are adorable.  Skeptical at first of the boy’s parentage, upon meeting him, Clark peers at the boy’s face and notices the family resemblance. Then the boy turns and watches a woman go by and whistles. “Welcome to the family!” Clark proclaims as he shakes the boy’s hand.

My favorite is the scene in which Clark is teaching little Nando how to properly construct–“Now we come to the moment of truth–onions or no onions?”– and eat a hamburger: “You have to approach a hamburger with assurance. If you show it that you’re frightened, you’ll wind up with a shirt full of mustard.”

His guidance of the boy is much needed–as the little guy wanders around dirty with no shoes, passing out nightclub flyers at 2:00am, smoking cigarettes, drinking wine and not going to school. Marietto was adorable and quite a good little actor too. Apparently he eventually became a doctor.

Clark tries to get the boy to embrace his American heritage–playing baseball with him, giving him a watch with an alarm, introducing him to milkshakes.

Of course Clark soon gets out of his stuffy suits, falls for Sophia and starts to embrace Capri and all it has to offer.

Clark was hesitant to take the role as he felt that he was far too old to be romancing the twenty-five-year-old Sophia Loren. The producers convinced him by showing him a film she had made with Cary Grant the year before, Houseboat. Clark liked the film and since Loren seemed to have chemistry with Grant, one of Clark’s contemporaries, he agreed to do It Started in Naples.

While Sofia is young and gorgeous and goes from queen to cook to nightclub dancer with ease, she is not an ideal mate for Clark here.

He is just too old for her, I must say. The year she was born he was in It Happened One Night!  The pairing is awkward and just not realistic. And it’s rather funny that he’s supposed to be engaged in this film and proclaims he’s been a lifelong bachelor–he just looks too old for any of this!

Kay and the children accompanied Clark on the location shoot. They sailed to Europe from New York in July 1959 and spent time in Holland, England, France and Austria before arriving in Rome and then renting a villa. While they were there, it was his stepson’s birthday. Kay had to run around trying to find cowboy gear so they could have a little party. This turned out to be their last family vacation.

It Started in Naples is available on DVD. 

Read more here and see pictures from the film in the gallery.