Alright, fellow tapeheads, gather 'round the flickering glow of the CRT in your mind. Tonight, we're digging deep into the European section of the old video store, past the familiar action heroes and blockbuster posters, to unearth a particular slice of 80s Italian zaniness: 1985's He Drives Me Crazy, or as our Italian cousins know it, È arrivato mio fratello (My Brother Has Arrived). Forget the explosive charges for a moment; this one’s all about comedic detonation, courtesy of one of Italy's most beloved funnymen.
### Double Trouble, Italian Style
Remember stumbling upon those foreign comedy VHS tapes? Sometimes the covers were loud, sometimes baffling, promising a different flavour of funny from the Hollywood fare we mainline? He Drives Me Crazy is exactly that kind of discovery. The premise is a comedy classic: identical twins causing chaos. We meet Ovidio Ceci (the inimitable Renato Pozzetto), a fastidious, slightly repressed university professor whose meticulously organised life is about to be thrown into a glorious, pasta-fueled blender. The catalyst? The unexpected arrival of his polar opposite twin brother, Raffaele, aka Raf (also Renato Pozzetto), a flamboyant, free-spirited, and utterly broke musician bursting with disastrous energy. It’s chalk and cheese, Lombardy style, and the sparks are pure comedic friction.
### The Pozzetto Show
Let's be clear: this film is a vehicle, first and foremost, for Renato Pozzetto. A comedic giant in Italy throughout the 70s and 80s, Pozzetto possessed a unique screen presence. He wasn't the slick leading man; he often played the bewildered everyman, reacting to absurdity with a signature deadpan stare that could break into moments of surprising physical comedy or surreal monologues. Here, he gets to play both straight man and chaos agent, and it's a delight watching him switch gears. Ovidio's pinched frustration versus Raf's effortless, oblivious charm – Pozzetto nails the duality. It’s a testament to his skill that even under Raf's ridiculous blonde wig and loud outfits, you buy them as distinct (if identical) personalities.
This film reunited Pozzetto with the directing and writing duo Franco Castellano and Giuseppe Moccia (often credited simply as Castellano & Moccia). These guys were comedy hitmakers in Italy, responsible for massive successes like Il bisbetico domato (1980, The Taming of the Scoundrel) starring Adriano Celentano. They knew how to craft crowd-pleasing comedies built around star personas, often using mistaken identity or "fish out of water" scenarios. Retro Fun Fact: After several blockbusters with Celentano, Castellano & Moccia found another perfect muse in Pozzetto, tailoring several successful comedies like this one to his specific comedic talents in the mid-80s.
### Milanese Mayhem and 80s Aesthetics
The film plunges us right into mid-80s Milan, and visually, it’s a time capsule. Forget gritty realism; this is the bright, sometimes garish world of 80s Italian mainstream comedy. Think slightly oversized blazers, questionable knitwear on Ovidio, Raf’s pop-star aspirations reflected in loud colours, and interiors that scream "designer decade." The love interest, Lidia, played by the charming American actress Carin McDonald, brings a touch of international flavour, often looking slightly bewildered by the Italian chaos swirling around her – much like a foreign viewer might! The score, too, likely features those synth melodies that instantly date a film but also wrap it in a warm blanket of nostalgia.
Retro Fun Fact: These Italian comedies, while hugely popular domestically (often out-grossing Hollywood imports), had a spotty journey internationally. Sometimes they'd get a limited release, maybe a dubious English dub that flattened the specific cultural humour, or they'd only appear years later on home video. Finding an original Italian VHS with subtitles, or even just finding the film at all in a North American video store, felt like uncovering a hidden gem, a secret handshake among cinephiles who looked beyond the mainstream shelves.
### The Rhythm of Italian Comedy
Compared to American comedies of the same era, which were perhaps leaning more into teen angst or high-concept premises, Italian comedies like this often relied more heavily on situational misunderstandings, rapid-fire dialogue (which can sometimes suffer in translation), and broad characterizations. Castellano & Moccia's direction keeps things moving at a brisk pace, setting up farcical situations – Raf impersonating Ovidio at the university, Ovidio getting tangled in Raf's messy romantic life – and letting Pozzetto work his magic. It’s not subtle, but it aims for laughs through escalating absurdity and the sheer force of Pozzetto's personality. The supporting cast, including familiar faces from Italian character acting like Armando Bandini, fill out the world with reliable comedic foils. Did it break new ground? Not really. But it delivered exactly what Italian audiences wanted from a Pozzetto/Castellano & Moccia team-up: familiar comfort food comedy.
Watching it now, especially if you managed to snag a tape back in the day, feels like rediscovering a slightly goofy European relative. The picture might be soft, the colours might bleed a little on your modern TV, but the charm is in its specific cultural context and its unapologetic embrace of 80s sensibilities. It lacks the slickness (and sometimes, the cynicism) of later comedies, offering instead a kind of earnest silliness.
### The Verdict
He Drives Me Crazy / È arrivato mio fratello isn't a lost masterpiece, nor is it aiming for high art. It's a star-driven vehicle, a product of its time and place, designed to make Italian audiences laugh through the sheer comedic force of Renato Pozzetto playing against himself. It's goofy, predictable in its twin-swap shenanigans, and dripping with 80s Italian style.
Rating: 6.5 / 10
Justification: The score reflects the film's primary strength: Renato Pozzetto's enjoyable dual performance, which carries the entire movie. It earns points for its specific 80s Italian nostalgic charm and the competence of the Castellano & Moccia formula. However, the humour is broad and very much of its era, the plot is formulaic twin-comedy fare, and its appeal might be limited for those unfamiliar with or not charmed by Pozzetto or this specific brand of European comedy. It's a fun, lighthearted watch for fans of the star or era-specific discoveries, but not essential viewing otherwise.
Final Thought: A delightful double dose of Pozzetto panic, this is the kind of charmingly dated Euro-comedy gem you might have happily stumbled upon on a rainy Tuesday night rental run – proof that sometimes, the most fun discoveries were hidden in the foreign language section.