Venga a prendere il caffè da noi (1970)

Emerenziano Paronzini, disabled after fighting on the Greek-Albanian front in the Second World War, works for the Ministry of Finance, traveling around the Varese and Como areas. Eventually, he is transferred to Luino, on Lake Maggiore, as deputy head of office. He has always been torn between work ethics—he proves inflexible with people who get ahead through connections—and a libidinous streak, indulging in the occasional paid affair. Now he feels he has “arrived”: he reflects on and tries to apply the principles of writer Paolo Mantegazza, whose work *The Physiology of Pleasure* is quoted and read aloud by the protagonist. A real man like him, at a certain age, needs the three Cs to feel good: caresses, warmth, and comfort. So he decides to court one of the three wealthy Tettamanzi sisters, heiresses to a handsome sum left by their father, Mansueto, a “legal advocate” with a passion for science and biology. He chooses Fortunata, but after their honeymoon he begins enjoying himself with his two sisters-in-law as well, increasingly intensifying his relationships with them. This happy arrangement lasts until, wanting to celebrate the anniversary of being awarded the War Cross (on the feast day of Saint Prisca the Virgin), he indulges in a huge feast with plenty to drink. That evening, after setting a record by being with all three sisters in one night, he is struck by thrombosis just as he is about to lust after the young maid Caterina, and ends up mute and confined to a wheelchair, waited on hand and foot.