(Image via Wikimedia Commons)
(Image via Wikimedia Commons)

Marta (Claudia Cardinale) and Nanda (Catherine Spaak) are a couple of young, hip ladies sharing an apartment until they can make their way up in the world. Marta works as a telephone operator, Nanda as a manicurist.

Both girls are trying to find husbands, but for very different reasons. Marta hopes to find true love, while Nanda is after a wealthy man who can provide for her, whether she cares for him or not. Marta uses her job to find potential matches for them.

Certo, certissimo, anzi… probabile, known in English as Certain, Very Certain, As a Matter of Fact… Probable or Diary of a Telephone Operator, was released in 1969. The film was directed and written for the screen by Marcello Fondato, from a story by Dacia Maraini.

This film takes a while to get on its feet. It starts out just plain awful — clunky and dull and with some very unsavory jokes. There are a few small laughs — like Nanda’s very obvious scheming to get Marta’s boyfriend alone, only to have him be completely ignorant of her advances the entire time — but these laughs are few and far between.

A couple moments of corn bring laughs later on in the film (at one point Cardinale’s character freaks out about spaghetti when her roommate tries to take her plate away), but again, these moments are not frequent enough or funny enough to make the film a good watch.

(Image via gentedirispetto.com)
(Image via gentedirispetto.com)

While it does improve ever-so-slightly as it moves along, Certo, certissimo, anzi… probabile‘s greatest assets are its music and fashion. The plot is light, the pace unsteady and most of the jokes unfunny.

This film appears in the Sensational Sixties Mill Creek set. The quality is not very good. Some vocal dubbing appears to have been used and it isn’t done well. Aside from the distracting dubbing, the picture is also a bit fuzzy.

Certo, certissimo, anzi… probabile is a real dud, and it hasn’t been well-preserved, so it isn’t worth watching even on the visual level. Skip this one unless you’re a Cardinale completist.

The score: 0.5/5