This article intervenes in current discussions on perceptions of aging, masculinity, and (in)fecundity, and their combined effect on perceptions of Italy. The first half of this piece centers on Berlusconi and the broader phenomenon of Berlusconismo. Drawing on queer theorist Lee Edelman’s notion of “reproductive futurism,” and works by Italian philosophers and scholars (Ida Dominijanni and Lorenzo Bernini) who bring together theories of psychoanalysis and biopolitics in their analyses of Berlusconi/Berlusconismo, I argue that the seasoned politician performs a version of virile masculinity in old age that is degraded, yet also undying, and that the neoliberal populism he promotes has created a climate that authorizes and advances racist/racializing reproductive politics. The second half of this article introduces a concept I name “sterile masculinity.” Moving from a short study of Berlusconi in the media to an analysis of male migrant characters in contemporary Italian films, I maintain that present-day, often intersecting, understandings of masculinity, race, and national belonging generated during globalization and migration—as seen through the continued practice of racializing and sexually and socially marginalizing non-national, “non-white” bodies—are informed both by the legacy of fascism in Italy and the biopolitics of Berlusconismo. What follows, however, is a close reading of a male migrant character who rehearses a notion of masculinity that resolves racially-motivated tensions, looks forward to a global Italy, and rehabilitates negative connotations of “sterility”: Bepi of Io sono Li (A. Segre, 2011).

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15781/bkvf-bx35