Just Because Its Old

...doesn't mean it's a classic. I don't know but after the bashing the Madonna/Guy Ritchie 2002 remake took by both critics and audiences alike, I guess I was expecting a little more with the original. Unfortunately, I didn't. Instead I got two characters I absolutely despised and that feeling never evaporated. In order for a love story to work, you have to feel for both the man and the woman. Yes, Raffaella does soften a bit of her snobby edges but she never elevates her emotions to the level where I felt she was really falling for Gennarino. Instead, she was only making the best of bad situation. Any romantic notions towards him can easily be the beginning stages of Stockholm Syndrome. And who could blame her? Gennarino was a crude, woman hater who really enjoyed smacking her around as well as attempting to brainwash her even to the point in the end when he's watching her from across the street. He never changed except when he realized that his slave had broken the reigns and liberated herself from his grasp.