I was expecting much more from this JOHNNY STECCHINO, because I though it was a comedy with Roberto Benigni I watched some years ago in the TV, but it isn't, and to be honest, it's much worse than I could ever expect! Its humor is too dated and it's so incredibly naïf, and ridiculous at parts, that I just can't imagine how can it have a 7/10 score here in IMDb! Of course it has a few funny jokes but they are too little compared to the naïf and ridiculous ones! It also disappointed me because I was expecting something better from an actor like Roberto Benigni. I can't score it better than 2/10!

One of the best comedies of Benigni. A fable, grandiose, based on a game of misunderstandings and misinterpretations. This film demonstrates the skill and ability ironic and comic of this great actor and director. As usual, the vote fell just because this site has a tendency to raise the vote and to lower depending on the sympathy of those who download, the film unfairly over the Internet and then play to make the alleged critics. One of the masterpieces of Benigni, other than the cretinate who say that precedes the masterpieces like life is beautiful. The masterpiece is already that. And all the comedy turns to guilt of a banana.ahaha

The combination of terrific physical comedy with the clever dialogue makes this subtitled movie glad you know how to read. Roberto Benigni takes a common theme of a look a like and turns it into one terrific comic vignette after another. His conversations of misunderstandings are brilliant.

A bus driver, Dante is picked up by a pretty woman, Maria, and taken to Palmetto. Once there he is dressed in a certain way and given a toothpick to carry in his mouth. Unbeknownst to him, he is a double of mafia informant Toothpick Johnny and Maria is setting him up to be killed in her husband's place. With misunderstandings piling up on top of misunderstandings Dante manages to evade assassination despite the attentions of the whole town.Before the Oscar, Benigni made this lightweight comedy that, in the mould of many old fashioned comedies, relies on the old double/mistaken identity chestnut to set it going. The story is pure daft, once we get past the double thing we still have to believe that Dante thinks he is being chased because he stole a banana! However it's still very funny in a comic fashion. The story ticks along through several set pieces - the banana theft, the opera, the dinner party etc, they're all charming because of Dante the clown - his charming fish out of water innocence is quite amusing.Benigni is good in dual roles - the best of course being Dante but the real Johnny is good as well. The rest of the cast are good but are only really foils for Benigni clowning.Overall it is very lightweight. It isn't laugh out loud funny but it has a certain comic charm throughout and does have some quite funny situations.