Beautiful, brilliant, and brutal! A universal tale of man and his environment. This film can be viewed as a social commentary of Southern versus Northern Italy and five different adaptations to modernization. The five brothers are compared to the five fingers on a hand ~ joined, yet each posits alternatives to existence. Structurally, this is shown in the films chapters devoted to each son. Vincenzo elects the petit-bourgeouis mileu; Simone, the brother with initial promise, maladapts, descending to animalism; Rocco chooses sacrifice, holding steadfast to the family clan and nostalgia; Ciro reveals integration within Milan society; and, finally, Luca offers promise. Visconti masterfully builds tension and characterization with the cinematic details of lighting, music, and montage.

Rocco and his Brothers probably has some sort of socialist hidden meaning, I'm sure of it. But since I didn't see it, I'm writing from my point of view -I am warning you that there's much more to look for in here than what I might have found-. Rocco ei suoi fratelli centers on a family of five brothers and a widowed mother. They move up to Milan from middle Italy, leaving their homeland behind. At first they struggle to adapt to the conditions of the city, all the while maintaining themselves a close-knit traditional family. But as the second oldest son begins to develop a successful boxing career, the vices inherent to a citadin life begin to get in the way of their harmony, embodied by the callgirl (Annie Girardot) he takes as girlfriend. She brings dischord between brothers by falling later for Rocco, the second to youngest. He is all goodness, forgiveness, and fanatical about his family and his traditions, played very movingly by Alain Delon.

As the story unfolds, Simone -the boxer brother- begins to grow fatter and weary, whereas Rocco begins to shine in the same sport... this stirs up jealousy and fear, respectively. When Simone loses the prostitute's love, Rocco wins it, and a dangerous rivalry is thus born. Simone, the decrepit figure -the citadin, corrupted by Milan- becomes Rocco's -the saintly, the countryman- worst enemy. He beats Rocco unconscious after finding him with the girl one evening, and then proceeds to humiliate her in his presence... yet his little brother insists that he should give her up, send her back to Simone, and forgive his brutality. The forces of extreme evil and extreme goodness seem to collide in a series of dramatic sequences, and it is self-evident that neither is ideal. Rocco's irrational good nature harms, instead of protects, him and his loved ones; the same can be said, of course, of Simone's over-the-top machismo.