Pane E Sciroppo di mais

Few images have stayed in my mind as indelibly as a scene from Franco Brusati’s Pane E Cioccolata. Here a group of illegal migrant workers living in a chicken coup spy on some Swiss skinny-dipping youth. They watch from their hovel, their faces covered in shit and pin feathers, enraptured by this vision of white pulchritude splashing about all flesh and sunshine and lazy dust motes. Nino feels the alienation most strongly and in an attempt at inclusion bleaches his hair. Eventually, he betrays himself when he roots for Italy during a football game.
     Outed.
     Like me at Holt Renfrew.

Image from F. Brusati’s Pane E Cioccolata (1974)