Pasolini coined the term "ideo-comic" to describe this unusual film that is at once a trenchant political critique and a delightful, offbeat comedy. It is an allegorial tale following the on-the-road exploits of three characters: a father, his son, and a talking crow who recounts Marxist fables and philosophies along the way. Father and son are jettisoned into the thirteenth century to serve St. Francis, a true man of the people, by teaching faith to the arrogant hawks, humble sparrows, and "dried up Christians." With The Hawks and the Sparrows Pasolini announces "the end of neorealism as a kind of limbo" ("the age of Brecht and Rossellini is finished," crows the crow). Pasolini, who rarely used professional actors and, when he did, chose them "for what they really are," cast the famous Italian clown and pantomimist Toto as the wistful, awkward father. As for the bird, Pasolini stated, "The crow is extremely autobiographical."* Pasolini employs a Keaton-like visual and physical slapstick, an experimental wackiness that has its narrative place as well. (Slapstick is the best revenge against intolerant villagers, for example; "Blessed is the world where everyone can get along, even those who can't.") But as in his other films, Pasolini's country roads and idylls also seem to reverberate with longing in this film that begins with the question, "Where is mankind going? Humph," and ends by eating crow. *(Pasolini quoted in Oswald Stack's Pasolini on Pasolini)