Illusione (1983)

Johnny is an illusionist who tours the various local theaters with his magic box act. The act involves his wife, Ramona, who steps into a large box which is then pierced with swords and knives. A crank is turned and sausages emerge from the other side which are then offered to the audience. One night when he opens the box the audience reaction is unusually ecstatic. Johnny looks inside and discovers to his horror that his wife is no longer there. She has simply vanished. His colleagues and the director of the theatre ask him how he managed to make the woman disappear, but Johnny has no idea how it happened. He rushes off to look for her. He returns to his home town where he first met her and visits her mother. He goes back to all the places of his childhood and to all the possible places where he might find her. But his search is fruitless. He begins to realize that he was living in a dream world before, but the sudden jolt caused by Ramona's disappearance has now made him feel oddly much more alive. The show must go on, however, and he must find another woman to replace Ramona. Life goes with its daily engagements and commitments. Johnny, having once had a glimpse of objective reality, feels its intensity fading away. Ramona turns up unexpectedly one evening - but only for a moment. She slips away again, leaving Johnny bewildered. When he finally finds her he realizes that she, like he and everyone else, has only played her own rôle in a world of habits and conventions that has little to do with reality. Johnny sadly comes to understand that life is closer to a dream, an illusion, and that objective reality (that which makes us feel intensely alive and separates us from the dream) is almost always out of our reach.