Aahana Swrup
Originally titled ‘Mica è Colpa Mia,’ Netflix’s ‘The Love Scam’ is an Italian rom-com film in which the path to true love ends up being more than a little crooked. A financially struggling single father, Vito is holding on to his family home in a dilapidated apartment complex as a last saving grace. However, his brother Antone’s troublemaking ways threaten the seizure of the place unless they can pay off a sizable debt. Consequently, Antone comes up with the idea for his brother to get close to Marina, a wealthy heiress, and dupe her out of a few thousand euros. While the plan seems easy enough on paper, Vito finds himself doubting his ability to walk the finish line once he gets to know his target better. As such, Vito and his unconventional family’s predicament becomes precarious until the very end. SPOILERS AHEAD!
The Love Scam Plot Synopsis
Vito’s last relationship ends unpleasantly after his partner takes her exit, leaving him to become a single father to their newborn baby, Napoleon. In her absence, he faces custody issues due to his unsteady profession as a part-time dishwasher at a local restaurant. Even when he tries to apply for a higher-paying job, he’s turned away once employers realize he’s a single father without any additional help. For the same reason, he’s dreading the upcoming custody case wherein social services will evaluate his ability to care for his son. Fortunately enough, he has some potential to win thanks to the ownership of his family apartment.
Vito’s flat is in a poorly maintained complex with leaky roofs, pest infestations, and more. While this drives most of the other tenants away—as they sell their houses for a fraction of their cost—Vito and her brother, Antone, refuse to leave. Nonetheless, after a fine notice arrives in the mail, the older brother realizes they may be forced to go back on their decision. Antone has always had a knack for getting into legally dubious trouble. As it turns out, he made a deal with someone to put down his property as a front for their shady business in exchange for money. However, now he owes De Leonardi Firm fifty thousand euros at the risk of losing the apartment.
Initially, Vito attempts to undo his brother’s mistake by arriving at the De Leonardi office to speak to the owner, Marina. Nonetheless, it quickly becomes evident that the woman has no time or patience to deal with such issues under the pressure of an upcoming Hotel project. Still, the brothers try again and sneak into a charity event. Even though Antone fails to get an audience with the architect, he manages to snag her phone in a moment of chaos. Later, as he goes through the device and learns more about Marina, he devises a scheme to solve their problem.
Antone wants Vito to pretend to be the owner of a charity looking to establish a new project. From there, he can use all the information Antone mines about Marina from her phone to seduce her and dupe her into funneling her charitable guilt toward them. Even though Vito is against the idea at first, he reluctantly gets on board after realizing it may be his only chance to ensure he has a fighting chance in Napolean’s custody case. Consequently, the two brothers concoct the perfect persona of Carlos and begin trying to force meet-cutes between Vito and Marina. After a few failed attempts, they realize they can use her love for cooking to force moments of connection. Furthermore, Vito starts making progress with her once he tries to befriend her rather than directly pitch his charity to her.
Therefore, the scheme becomes stretched out and more elaborate than either brother thought as Vito convinces Marina to help him out with a charity dinner. The two begin meeting up regularly to hang out and decide the menu. Naturally, Marina’s father and her boyfriend, Frederico, notice the sudden change in her demeanor as she becomes more and more joyful and carefree. Eventually, the day of the staged dinner arrives, and Marina chooses to skip out on an important business meeting to help out Vito, whom she knows as Carlos. At the end of the night, as rehearsed, Vito delivers the news that despite their best efforts, the donations ended up falling short. This compels Marina to open up her own wallet to help out her friend’s cause.
The Love Scam Ending: Does Vito Scam Marina?
From the get-go, Vito remains reluctant to accept Antone’s idea of tricking an otherwise innocent woman out of her money. Nonetheless, his desperation to stay in possession of his home drives him to extreme measures. Despite his shortcomings, Vito wants to be a good father to his son. Nevertheless, his current position in life is making it impossible. He can’t look after his kid and have a full-time job since he can’t afford regular babysitting. Worse yet, his brother’s shenanigans threaten to take away the one advantage he has going for him in the battle for Napolean’s custody. For the same reason, he realizes he’s willing to do anything to ensure he can keep his home.
Furthermore, once Vito actually gets to know Marina while she’s in her element, he can’t help but grow endeared toward her. As such, each day spent pretending to be Carlos offers more time to get to know the intriguing woman. Yet, it soon becomes evident that his growing affection for Marina would become a point of conflict in Antone’s overarching scheme. Vito can’t help but actually care for the woman once the two get closer over the course of their charity dinner prep. As a result, even though he makes his final move and even secures a promise from her to donate fifty thousand euros, he can’t bring himself to go through with the scam.
In the end, Vito decides to come clean about the entire thing to Marina and spare her the humiliation of getting duped. As for his problem with child services, he decides on another extreme solution and plans to skip town with Antone and Napoleon. Nevertheless, he ultimately doesn’t get a chance to follow through on his honest intentions. All this time, Frederico has been getting suspicious of his girlfriend’s behavior. Therefore, on the day of the charity dinner, he snoops around in her office and finds the restaurant’s address. From there, he follows Vito to his house and realizes his true identity. Consequently, the same night, Marina confronts him about his lies and storms off once she realizes she has been getting played this entire time.
Why Does Marina Help Vito and Antone?
In the aftermath of the scam’s reveal, things quickly devolve into a mess for the two brothers. Vito and Antone end up having to sign over the rights to the property since they’re unable to pay off the latter’s fines. Meanwhile, Marina and Frederico continue working on their hotel project. However, soon enough, Vito discovers that Marina’s Firm is actually the same company that has been trying to buy out the tenants from the apartment complex so that they can demolish the site and build a new hotel. In order to grease things along, they have also been intentionally causing problems in the complex to drive people away, including a faked notice for the building’s risk of collapse.
Vito’s frustration compels him to confront Marina about her company’s corrupt ways in light of the discovery. As it turns out, she has been in the dark about these details all this time. Her partner, Frederico, has been handling the project’s acquisition portion and carrying out these immoral actions. In fact, he had intentionally backed Antone into a corner by tricking him into the inciting deal since he and Vito were the last of the tenants to hold onto the property. Unlike Frederico, Marina doesn’t wish to push people out of their homes and put a corrupt light on her family business. Yet, she doesn’t have enough evidence to take Frederico down on her own. For the same reason, she decides to team up with Vito and his friends to bring down her now ex-boyfriend.
Do Vito and Antone Lose Their Home?
In order to reveal Frederico’s trick, Marina and the others must catch him red-handed in the act. Therefore, the architect decides to take a page out of Antone’s book and use Frederico’s schedule against him. She knows he has recently rescheduled an appointment with the city mayor, which could only mean he is meeting up with someone even more useful to him. Thus, she concludes that if they follow him, they’ll be able to mine evidence against his corrupt ways. This brings her and Vito to partake in a sleuth chase through town wherein they follow Frederico, who meets up with a guy in a parking lot.
Although Vito runs into some issues—namely, a troublesome kid with a water gun and an old lady with a broom—he manages to catch Frederico’s shady exchange on his phone’s camera. Predictably, his and Marina’s amateur detective skills get them noticed by the man. Still, Marina stands up to him, asserting that she plans on revealing his trickery to her father. Consequently, moments before the demolition of the apartment complex commences, she manages to alert her father. As a result, the demolition stops since neither Marina nor her father wants to attach bad faith practices to their Firm’s name. Afterward, they return the properties to the rightful tenants, including Vito and Antone.
What Happens to Vito and Marina?
As other aspects of the story begin to wrap up, Vito and Marina’s romance remains the last unsolved piece of the puzzle. Throughout their earlier companionship, when Vito was attempting to scam her, the two surprisingly got close to one another. Even though the single father thought he wouldn’t be able to let anyone else into his life after the betrayal of Napolean’s mother, he finds himself growing softer toward Marina. Similarly, Marina unveils an unexpected part of her identity that pushes her to be spontaneous and carefree in Vito’s presence. Still, the truth of the attempted scam makes their relationship more than complicated.
Marina can’t trust that Vito ever truly cared for her outside of wanting to squeeze profit out of her. However, Antone ends up having the perfect remedy for this complication. He sneaks his brother’s phone out of his pocket and into Marina’s purse. Later, he messages Vito’s phone to compel Marina to go through a voice message. After Vito had decided against scamming Marina, he left a heartfelt voicemail to Antone, describing his true feelings for the woman. Therefore, once Marina listens to the message, it gives her reason to put her trust in him.
Eventually, Marina visits Vito’s workplace, where she meets the real Vito outside of his Carlos charade. It’s evident that she hasn’t been able to stop thinking about him either, and it doesn’t take long for the pair to end up together. Months down the line, Marina and Vito have been a couple for a long time and have started a business together. They’re running an open-space restaurant outside of the apartment complex, with the brothers’ flat as their kitchen.
Marina no longer works for the stressful Firm and enjoys the life of a well-loved cook in her community. Furthermore, a notice from the social services arrives confirming Vito’s sole custody of Napolean. Thus, the couple heads toward a happy ending. That is, until another mail comes for Antone—this time alerting him of a deal gone wrong with a Japanese firm. The revelation sets the characters up for a potential future sequel while also establishing that Vito’s life is bound to remain entertainingly chaotic, thanks to his brother’s efforts.
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