Italian epic from Visconti which has a premise that would make a great soapie - a widowed mother and four hot sons move from the south to Milan in order to find work and live with a fifth hot son. They have various adventures, squabble over women, try different jobs. The main story involves sensitive Alain Delon (in a star making debut - he's awesome) and tougher Renato Salvatori, both of whom love the same woman, Annie Giradot, a hooker with a heart of gold.
There's lots of angst, beautiful photography, homo eroticism (the boys taking showers, a lecherous boxing manager, boxing), misogyny, gorgeous Nino Rota score. Claudia Cardinale pops up in a relatively small role, as the fiancee of the eldest brother (who isn't in it that much - neither are the two brothers who aren't Delon or Salvatori; while Giradot is fine, I'm a big Cardinale fan and wish she'd played that part). Their mother Katina Paxinou wails and carries on and I kept wishing she'd be shot or would die - the film would have been better if this character had been stronger or more interesting.
There are two stand out sequences, which really hit you in the gut - Giradot's rape, and, later, murder, with Delon finding out about it. These are devastating. The movie could have been shorter.
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