Il venditore di medicine (2013)

Bruno, who is married to Anna, works as a pharmaceutical sales representative for Zafer, a company that makes medicines. Although he is a good salesman, the atmosphere at the company is tense. One of his colleagues, after being harshly reprimanded by area manager Giorgia, kills himself by shooting himself in his car. Increasingly closely monitored by his superiors, Bruno makes his rounds among his “queens”—the doctors who prescribe the drugs he presents. He offers some of them promotional items and actual gifts, ranging from lunches and mobile phones to sponsorships to attend medical conferences abroad. The rule is that a gift must bring in eleven times its cost: an expense of 2,000 euros must generate at least 22,000 euros in sales and prescriptions, or the company makes no profit. Although this kickback practice is illegal, it is widespread, and Bruno treads carefully among pharmacists and friendly doctors, such as Filippo, who often ask him for favors, and others who are more doubtful, if not outright hostile, and put professional ethics ahead of any inducement from the pharmaceutical company. These include a new general practitioner, who is scandalized by Bruno’s offer of a tablet, files a complaint against him and Zafer, and Dr. Miceli, a young resident who, infatuated with Bruno, had written hundreds of prescriptions for him, including for patients who had died. Another event turns Bruno’s life upside down. In the waiting room of one of his “queens,” he runs into a childhood friend, Stefano, who now has pulmonary fibrosis, contracted after agreeing, driven by the economic crisis, to serve as a guinea pig for pharmaceutical tests. Bruno learns that his friend is waiting for an experimental drug, which is unlikely to reach Italy and would in any case be beyond his means. Shaken both by his friend’s situation and by the way his “queen” treats him, Bruno decides to help him. At work, anxious not to lose his job, Bruno—who is also taking anti-anxiety medication because of the pressure—asks Giorgia, who is herself under pressure from the company’s executives, to give him a more demanding assignment: a “shark,” meaning an important doctor with a very large number of patients who consequently writes thousands of prescriptions. He is given a task no one has managed to accomplish: persuading Professor Malinverni, head of the San Cristoforo Hospital, to take on a chemotherapy drug. Malinverni appears beyond reproach and incorruptible, but he has no interest in the drug or in any proposal. During their meeting at the hospital, however, Bruno notices the deputy head, Dr. Foli, whom he also tries unsuccessfully to bribe. Meanwhile, in an effort to save his sick friend, Bruno obtains Stemidone, the experimental lifesaving drug Stefano needs, from a young pharmaceutical sales representative, in exchange for advice on how to win over the various “queens” and get ahead in the job. Filippo tells Bruno that Malinverni is far from beyond reproach and is concealing illegal dealings with his head nurse. Breaking into the hospital at night, Bruno finds incriminating documents in the archives relating to the diversion of hospital equipment to private clinics. He uses them to blackmail Malinverni, also making him believe that it was his deputy, Dr. Foli, who handed Bruno the documents. Malinverni gives in and agrees to introduce Zafer’s drug at the hospital. But Bruno’s professional success comes at the cost of his personal life, which is deteriorating. Things are no better at home: his wife Anna wants a child and stops taking the pill, but Bruno thinks the timing is wrong because his job is uncertain. So he gets a prescription for contraceptives from a doctor friend and secretly puts them in her food. When Anna, who has begun to suffer nausea and fainting spells, becomes ill and ends up in hospital, she discovers that her husband has deceived her and wants nothing more to do with him. The situation is further aggravated when a doctor reports Bruno for attempted bribery. Although the trial ends with Bruno and Zafer being acquitted for lack of evidence, his attempt to win his wife back fails, and Anna loudly drives him away when he tracks her down at the school.