Io so che tu sai che io so (1982)

Fabio and Livia Bonetti, a married couple with a daughter, Veronica, lead an apparently normal, almost monotonous life. Fabio’s days pass between his job at a bank and soccer matches, while he remains distant from family life. One day, he happens to discover that Livia has been followed and filmed for several days by a private investigator. When he goes to the agency for an explanation, he learns that it was actually a simple case of mistaken identity: the person who was supposed to be followed was Elena Vitali, who lives in the penthouse above the Bonettis’ apartment—which they own—and is the wife of Osvaldo Vitali, an influential economist and politician. Mrs. Vitali had inadvertently caused the mix-up by lending her car to Livia. At first Fabio laughs it off, goes home, and tells his wife about the misunderstanding, but she seems very worried. Soon afterward, they learn that Dr. Vitali has killed himself in London. Worried that they might become involved, they begin to wonder what Mrs. Vitali may have done while she was under surveillance. One day, Fabio happens to see Livia go into the agency and come out with a suitcase containing the footage concerning her, which she then hides in the cellar. Suspicious, he takes the suitcase with him to the country house, where, alone, he begins watching the footage. He discovers that Livia knows he had been having an affair with his colleague Valeria, and that the two women met and told each other about the sexual relationships they had had with him. He also discovers that Livia intends to leave him, and that he does not know her as well as he thought: she is forceful with strangers, for example, and has a habit of drinking wine despite claiming to be a teetotaler. Fabio also learns that Veronica is a drug addict and that her mother and boyfriend, Marco, are helping her. These discoveries open Fabio’s eyes to life and its problems, but also to how much his wife still loves him and wants to protect him from everything. After discovering her daughter’s drug addiction, Livia helps her fight it, saves her from prostitution, and avenges her by running over Fabio’s friend, lawyer Ronconi, who had introduced her to drugs—all without ever telling Fabio. Every day at the country house, Fabio watches one of the recorded films, then returns home in the evening. On the third day, he learns that he is terminally ill and has very little time left to live, and that Livia had decided not to tell him. Desperate, she had spoken only to Roman, for whom she had done a translation, about Fabio’s tragic illness. Deeply saddened, Fabio walks despondently, reflecting on his life, which seems about to come to an end. Then he goes back inside to watch the rest of the footage and sees Livia meeting with Roman, who tells her that Fabio is actually well and that the mistake was caused by a mix-up of medical records. Fabio thus learns that he is in excellent health. He jumps for joy and cries out happily, but the following footage soon brings him back to reality: it shows Livia, happy to learn that Fabio is well, calling him (in a scene from earlier in the film) and telling him how much she loves him and wants to make love to him. Fabio, however, brusquely replies that he has already planned to watch Roma’s match on television, rudely rejecting Livia’s advances. The next footage shows his wife in bed with Roman, regretting the revenge she has just taken. Extremely distressed by this terrible discovery, Fabio struggles to stop himself from committing suicide. Before going home, he throws the suitcase containing the footage into the nearby river. Livia, who had secretly come to look for him at the country house, watches him without being seen. When he gets home, Fabio breaks down in tears, clumsily tries to strangle his wife but cannot bring himself to do it, and then confides in his daughter, who is cooking dinner. Veronica comforts him, saying that her mother’s affair happened only once and that she did not even enjoy it. The couple are left alone to have dinner together, but instead of confiding in him, Livia once again chooses not to openly confess her infidelity. Instead, she says that a husband—a responsible man with real problems, as Fabio is—should not be scandalized by the possibility that his wife might be unfaithful, unlike Dr. Vitali, who decided to take his own life for that very reason. At last, the Bonettis can talk freely at the table, drinking wine, about their everyday lives without hiding their unhappy experiences, which in fact help strengthen their bond. After all, “I know that you know that I know.”