Misunderstood

Misunderstood (1967) is Luigi Comencini's quietly devastating Italian drama, now streaming online on iFILM. A British consul in Florence is left to raise two young sons after his wife's sudden death.

Convinced his elder boy, Andrea, is the tough one who barely mourns, the grieving father pours all of his tenderness into the younger child. He never sees that Andrea is swallowing his own grief to spare him. That single blind spot drives the whole film — a boy aching to be noticed by the one adult who keeps reading him wrong.

Anthony Quayle plays the father, with Stefano Colagrande and Simone Giannozzi as the brothers. Comencini shoots much of it from a child's eye level, and the result became a landmark of Italian films about childhood. Be warned: it earns its tears honestly and won't leave you light. Watch Misunderstood (1967) online on iFILM.