While his name may be somewhat obscure to some, Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia is a vitally important figure in the history of Italian cinema, specifically if we are looking at a specific era in the nation’s artistic output. One of its most cherished figures in terms of comedy, Bragaglia was a fascinating individual, since his career stretched from the earlier stages of Italian cinema, right through to its peak, where there were regular masterpieces produced, many of which would not have been possible without his commitment to leaping between fact and reality in his pursuit of some extraordinarily deep themes, all contained under the careful guise of the kind of offbeat humour that Italy did so remarkably well. One of his best films is If I Was Honest (Italian: Se io fossi onesto), which tells the story of an impoverished engineer who comes into contact with a wealthy businessman who is about to be sent to prison for forgery, and ultimately coerced into taking his place for the brief incarceration, only to emerge on the other side embroiled in an increasingly challenging series of misadventures that cause him to forget his own identity as a whole. There’s something so absolutely electrifying about this film, especially in how Bragaglia infuses every scene with an abundance of detail, proving to be a master of his craft in more ways than one, which leads to a suitably charming and often provocative work of classic-era comedy.

Hilariously irreverent but simmering with a lot of social and cultural commentary, If I Was Honest is a peculiar film, but one that knows exactly how to find new ways to evoke laughter, which is one of the hallmarks of the great comedic directors like Bragaglia, who often viewed humour as an art, one that is not innate to anyone who attempted to produce comedies, but rather something that should be perfected like a carefully-studied science. The precision with which this film is made, and how it constructs its jokes with an almost razor-sharp commitment, is fascinating, and leads to a film far more complex than it appears on the surface. It helps that the director is making use of a common trope, that of two people drawn from opposing sides of the social spectrum temporarily switching places, only to find themselves facing hilarious consequences, which was popularised by Mark Twain in his classic parable of The Prince and the Pauper, which serves as the foundational text of this film, even if it is never directly referenced. This slightly more traditional structure gives the film an anchor, and allows it to covertly insert some more abstract ideas that would be otherwise difficult to include had it not had a clear sense of what it ultimately wanted to convey. It’s a small film, and some of its jokes don’t always land – but considering the rapid-fire humour that defines the narrative, it’s impossible not to be at least partially enamoured of this particularly off-kilter brand of socially-mediated madness.

However, the experience of watching a film like If I Was Honest entails more than just focusing on the comedy in isolation, but also looking at it from the perspective of other components. Produced in 1942, the film stood at the threshold of the movement we’ve come to label as Italian neo-realism. Previously, there had been various works that some consider to have sown the seeds that would eventually flourish into the hauntingly beautiful and deeply harrowing depictions of the realities faced by people in Italy during the Second World War, but it had not reached its apex just yet. If I Was Honest is not directly related, since it is an outrageous comedy that consists of several bizarre and implausible scenarios, far more than could even be considered realistic. However, if we look beyond the execution and focus on the smaller details, we find various intriguing elements that draw our attention to the possibility that, like many of his contemporaries, Bragaglia was working within a kind of comedy that alluded to deeper issues, particularly those embedded within Italian society and its often challenging and disconcerting structure, which unfortunately emphasised economic status and influence above everything else. It’s a very funny film, but it seems to contain a deep sadness that anticipates the rise of the more sobering works in the forthcoming years, being a melancholy work of social commentary that is layered with heaps of irreverent comedy, which makes for a suitably challenging satire.

On the subject of neorealism, we have to acknowledge the presence of Vittorio De Sica as the primary character in the film – If I Was Honest has some incredible performances, but its De Sica that somehow manages to stand out the most, especially since a viewer armed with the knowledge about where his own career would head (not necessarily as an actor, but a director) helps redirect our attention to the idea that this film was an early forerunner of the neorealist movement, with De Sica’s work as a journeyman actor earlier in his career giving him a firm entry-point into constructively patriotic stories. Even beside the strength of the film, we encounter a performance that is brimming with life – hilariously upbeat and very funny, but grounded within reality. De Sica is one of many actors who work together to bring this story to life. The ensemble is responsible for so many of the film’s successes, and its difficult to imagine If I Was Honest being nearly as successful without De Sica and his co-stars like Sergio Tofano, Paolo Stoppa and María Mercader, all of which provide invaluable contributions to the film and prove to be the sources of a lot of amusement, which is much more than can be said about slightly less-successful comedies produced at the time, when the emphasis was on a neverending stream of jokes, rather than actually developing their characters beyond mere archetypes.

If I Was Honest may be slightly obscure, but this does not mean that it doesn’t deserve attention, especially as we are starting to unearth these forgotten masterpieces, many of which are considered hallmarks of their respective genres. Perhaps calling this a lost work of unhinged brilliance may seem forthright and hyperbolic, but there is something so endearing about this kind of radically creative, deeply meaningful social comedies that use humour not only as a tool to entertain, but also as an entry-point into a much deeper and far more promising narrative landscape. Blisteringly funny, but layered with meaning, the film is a curiously complex work that draws on a range of wildly disparate ideas to realize its abundance of details – it’s primarily a comedy-of-errors, but it touches on issues around social inequality, identity and political strife, all of which are seamlessly woven into the narrative and delivered with rapid-fire humour, which is a lot more than can be said about some far more sobering dramas produced at the time with similar material. If I Was Honest is a charming work that may not seem serious at first glance, but is far more complex the more time we spend with these characters and the scenarios in which they find themselves, becoming rich, evocative comedy with a lot of social gravity beneath the surface.