I bet that car horn was the 'Crazy Frog' of 1962 after this came out. Very interesting that Alexander Payne admits of the "formal and thematic debts his film Sideways" owes to this film as well.
The paramount feature of Italian highway driving is il sorpasso. The word sorpassare means both “to pass with an automobile” and “to surpass or excel.” To sorpassare someone is to excel him socially, morally, sexually, and politically. By the same token, to be sorpassato is to lose status, dignity, and reputation. Thus, it is not where you arrive that counts but what (or whom) you pass on the way.
— Jackson Burgess: Sex and the Italian Driver from the January 1, 1970, issue of Holiday magazine.
Risi here expresses his vision of an archetypal Italian soul, and Bruno’s hedonistic acts anticipate the critical years to follow: in less than a decade, Italy would face economic austerity, social conflict, and terrorism. [Risi’s] courageous proposition spoke directly to the guts of the public, as if someone were finally saying something sincere about the reality of Italian culture, customs, and dreams. This is what we are, and we cannot be different, the movie proclaimed: comedy goes along with tragedy, or, to quote screenwriter Ennio Flaiano, “In Italy, the situation is always tragic, but never serious.”
— Antonio Monda (Criterion)
The film testifies to the Italian love affair with the car, during the boom years, as a way to satisfy restless nervous energy and provide the illusion of getting ahead.
— Phillip Lopate (Criterion)
Though the film’s downer ending might come across as unearned, [the] whiff of sudden death has been in the air from the moment Bruno capitalizes on a roadside fatality to acquire some “lightly used” furniture at a substantial discount.
— Budd Wilkins (Slant Magazine)
Roberto, a shy law student in Rome, meets Bruno, a forty-year-old exuberant, capricious man, who takes him for a drive through the Roman and Tuscany countries in the summer. When their journey starts to blend into their daily lives though, the pair’s newfound friendship is tested.