00:05Mom, only for you my song flies, mom, you will be with me, you will not be alone anymore, I look, I love you,
00:24these balls...
00:29Today we're going to tell you a story, but not one of those happy endings that mothers use to put their children to sleep.
00:37their children, this is a tale written in blood, by a mother for her children, but it is a
00:48secret tale.
00:52Like all fairy tales, it is populated by ogres, monsters, devils and witches.
01:03But unfortunately this is a true fairy tale, a fairy tale that hides its heart in a world now far away, a
01:12a world made of toil, survival, misery, an Italian peasant world that our grandparents knew and now no longer exists
01:23more.
01:23This is the story of the soap maker from Correggio.
01:32We are in the lower Emilia region. Correggio, with its 20,000 inhabitants, is the second largest city after the capital Reggio Emilia.
01:41inhabited area of the province.
01:42Not quite a village, but not a real city either.
01:48It is a day in December 1939, a Monday, the 18th.
01:55Exactly in a week it's Christmas.
02:00The smell of broth with cappelletti will then fill the streets and alleys of Correggio.
02:05But Faustina Setti, this lady dressed to the nines, will eat her cappelletti elsewhere, if she ever eats them this Christmas.
02:18In fact, Faustina, or Arabitti, as everyone calls her here in town, went to the hairdresser early this morning.
02:26She dyed her head pitch black, and styled that poor thin hair she has
02:32in the head,
02:33and then she applied a coat of lipstick in a vivid, bright, and out-of-place red.
02:40But why is Faustina 73 years old? Where is she going?
02:48She goes, at least that's what she said, to settle down with a rich widower.
02:55Hope. Hope and fear are the feelings that animate her as she walks in her new shoes and dark coat.
03:05Perhaps she is thinking back to her husband, who was taken away from her by cancer in May.
03:11Tick-tock. Tick-tock, she hears for the zecciato. Tick-tock. And her dentures rattle in her mouth.
03:18On the street, no one.
03:21But the thousand eyes of the country are watching.
03:27Before leaving, he sold his house, linens and furniture.
03:31Because I want to spend the last years of my life well.
03:36He confided.
03:37Dear Cianciulli will take care of everything.
03:42Well, it is above all dreams that fill Faustina's baggage.
03:47The desperate dreams of a woman in her seventies, who still believes life can repay some debt she owes.
03:58He traveled 300 meters from Via Roma to Siena, passing through Via Mazzini.
04:05And she set off along the Cavour route.
04:08Here he knocked on the door of number 11.
04:11Foglia Palace.
04:13A shadow, at the third-floor window, saw her approaching.
04:25The door opens and Faustina disappears inside.
04:35Late summer of the following year.
04:38It is September 5, 1940.
04:41A Thursday.
04:43The curious eyes behind the shutters of Correggio observe another departure.
04:49That of Francesca Soami.
04:51Whom everyone here calls Clementina, the teacher.
04:56Because he helps about fifteen schoolchildren with their homework.
05:01Clementina is good and naive.
05:04Believer and gullible.
05:06He recently turned 55.
05:09But now Clementina is bored.
05:13She will go to be a governess or even a director in a children's boarding school.
05:20Cianciulli found the job for him.
05:24Dear and generous friend Cianciulli.
05:29The one with the sweets and pastries, the donuts and licorini that she loves to give away so much.
05:36She sold everything too.
05:39And at 8:30 on that Thursday someone sees her disappear around the corner.
05:45Head towards Corso Cavour number 11.
05:48The door opens.
05:54Two months later.
05:56Summer is now over.
05:59And Saturday, November 30th.
06:02The first autumn fogs descend on the lowlands.
06:06And like in a Fellini film they drown everything.
06:09Present, past and future.
06:14Virginia is also leaving very early in the morning.
06:22She, who is 59 years old, was once a popular soprano.
06:29None other than Toscanini will be live.
06:32He toured Virginia.
06:34In Buenos Aires, when he no longer had any hope, he met the love of his life.
06:40Alfredo.
06:41Alfredo Fanti.
06:42A first violin.
06:44For two years, happiness reigned in Virginia's life.
06:49Until cruel fate took her husband away from her.
06:55Virginia, too, had been to the hairdresser the day before to have her thick, bleached hair done.
07:03He said
07:05I'm leaving.
07:06Comb my hair well.
07:08Because I have to make an impression.
07:10There's a place in Florence that Cianciulli got me.
07:14He confided in someone.
07:18He also said something that should never be said.
07:22My life is a novel and will end like a novel.
07:26Because novels don't always end happily.
07:35And now she too enters the door of number 11 Corso Cavour.
07:49If we waited outside that door, nothing would happen.
07:56If we wait hours, days, or months, we will never see Virginia come out again.
08:04Just as we have not seen either Faustina Setti or Clementina come out.
08:09But now, where has Virginia gone?
08:16We enter that apartment on the third floor of Corso Cavour 11.
08:33The heart of the house.
08:35A beautiful, spacious and functional kitchen.
08:40There is the wood-fired kitchen, with its burners, which also serves as a stove for cold winters
08:48from up here.
08:50Other stoves burn with the first gas cylinders, the black ones.
08:56Above, pots boiling.
09:00And then, a really huge cauldron, the kind used to make salsa and tomatoes.
09:09There is a woman who stirs and checks from time to time.
09:13He opens the lids, looks inside, closes them again.
09:22Near the table, two buckets, filled with some liquid.
09:32It is thick and reddish.
09:36Gelatinous.
09:39A nauseating, rotting flesh-like smell hits your nose like a dagger.
09:50But this is a crime scene.
09:54And if so, where is the body?
09:57The corpse?
10:01There is nothing macabre around.
10:05The horror, however, is hidden in unexpected forms.
10:12On the table, some white pieces.
10:15Fats.
10:17In forms.
10:19If you get close, they give off a strong cologne smell.
10:24And violet ball.
10:26Hmm, if it's soap, it must not have turned out well.
10:32In the oven, some tasty pastries, just the right amount of crunchy.
10:37Horror lurks.
10:40Because in those white shapes and those crunchy biscuits, there is what remains of Mrs. Virginia Caciotto.
10:50And what this jovial woman, who has returned to the stove, has accomplished,
10:56it's absurd.
10:58He did something that made him the prototype of a dark, authentic black star.
11:12In perceiving.
11:16We like to run with the wolves from the darker sea.
11:26No, no, no.
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