L'Emozione della Grande Corsa - 2022

Mille Miglia. Ideal testing ground of the new world and of the
new system of understanding the life that is imposing itself.
Boldness and machismo merge and increase the octanes of
leaded and heavy gasoline. Castor oil passes to other roles and
lubricates the red-hot engines with unmistakable smells. It is
immediately endless love, between the Italians and the Mille
Miglia. And the stories arise spontaneously, the fables get bigger
and bigger, like those narrated by the hunters, the myths. It is a
strange Italy, the one that looks out the windows, or waits with
the chairs stuffed, gathered in clusters of humanity, on the corner
of the streets and on the limit of the carriages.
A strange Italy made up of poor people, as we all were in those
times of sons of the people and social struggles, which takes off,
at least for one night, the patches from the butt and the patches
from the elbows and grants itself the luxury, cheap, of dreaming.
Strapaese and stracittà merge, like the black clouds emanating
from the chimneys of the new industrial giants. Italy finally has
its empire and its heroes, on four wheels or in fez or legionnaires,
whatever you call them. The years are 1935 and 1936 and gradually
time rushes towards the nightmare of war, but the Mille Miglia
continues unperturbed to grind kilometers. Only the Liberators
B-17 and their bombs dropped in tons on monuments and abbeys
and kindergartens and schools will reduce the route, confining
it to territories that are still vaguely safe. The long dirt road of
the Mille Miglia seems never to be interrupted, it skirts, during
the immediately, second, tragic post-war, the still smoking ruins
and the ghosts that prowl around ghostly and incredulous on the
hottest nights of May.
The long theory of cars flows like a river and right to the great
river that it crosses tells its stories. Real stories that sound like
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