Ugly, Dirty and Bad

Ugly, Dirty and Bad (Brutti, sporchi e cattivi, 1976) is a searing Italian black comedy you can watch online on iFILM. Director Ettore Scola won the Best Director prize at Cannes for this portrait of Rome's urban poor, with Nino Manfredi at its squalid center.

Old Giacinto rules over a crowded shack on the city's outskirts, home to four generations of his sprawling family. Some haul garbage, some steal, some sell themselves. None of it matters to Giacinto as much as the insurance payout he received for losing his eye — cash he keeps hidden and guards with paranoid fury. His relatives scheme, whisper, and wait. He suspects every single one of them, and he's right to.

Scola never romanticizes poverty. His characters are selfish, loud, and sometimes monstrous — and the film is darkly funny precisely because of it. Stream Ugly, Dirty and Bad (1976) online on iFILM.