This Must Be the Place

Cheyenne (Sean Penn) is a retired glam rock star, boring the hell out of life in Dublin with his wife of many decades. This low key life is interrupted by his estranged father who is on his death bed in New York. In the hope of a late reconciliation, he travels to the US only to arrive too late. What he discovers is that his dad was a survivor of Auschwitz and was tortured by a former SS officer who is still at large. Cheyenne takes it upon himself to track down the office and bring him to justice. So ensues a surreal road trip across the US as Cheyenne unwittingly starts on a path of self discovery and awakening. A brilliant film that echoes with the touch of the Coen brothers and Penn playing a unique role like he has never done before.

Rating: * * *

Le Quattro Volte

An ailing shepherd is the focal point of the movie. Or maybe it is goats that he herds. Or the fact that he believes the dust of a church to be a magic elixir. The reality is that director Michelangelo Frammartino took his artistic license and turned it in to a license to kill by stepping over the fine line between stillness and boredom. Then there is also the possibility that he is the best friend of Abbas Kiarostami.

Rating: *

Gomorrah

Italian mafioso brings to mind the magical world of Godfather where you were rooting for the gangsters and their twisted sense of honor. Matteo Garrone destroys that fantasy by focusing his lens on Camorra, the oldest crime syndicate running amok in Campania, Italy. 

To show their multi pronged reach, Garrone enlists a plethora of characters. Toto, a grocery delivery boy running errands for his mother in a crumbling housing project. Don Ciro, the money runner, delivering hard cash to the family of mob members in prison. A tailor who gives illegal classes to workers in a Chinese sweat shop. The college graduate who works for a corrupt business man involved in illegal waste disposal. And to top it off, a couple of cocky wannabe Scarfaces!

In every storyline Garrone slides the mafiosa in and by not making them the prime focus, the effect is quadruple. The haphazard editing forces the viewer to concentrate and it only increases the power of the film's delivery. But its most important feature is that of stripping the gangsters of all their glamor and glorification. They are shown in their basest form, paranoid, violent and sans any honor or humanity. Some might be annoyed that the storylines having no connection. But there in really lies the master class of Garrone as he shows us the infiltration depth of the mafia in daily life in Naples.

Rating: * * * +

Days and Clouds

Elsa's (Margherita Buy) joy of graduating with her PhD is cut short when she discovers that her husband, Michele (Antonio Albanese), has been kicked out of his business. As he struggles to find a job, what splashes across the screen are the scenes of a family crumbling in the face of being taken out of its comfort zone. A film thick with desperation but I think that's exactly how the director meant it to be.

Rating: * * +

Malèna

The boys stand on the boardwalk overlooking sea, that like many things took me back to the Malecon, waiting with bated breath. The receipt of their pants is the sultry Malèna (Monica Bellucci), walking from home into town. Of the boys, Renato's (Giuseppe Sulfaro) heart beats faster, and in his mind with more purity for her. When the World War claims her husband, she finds herself at the mercy of the town for the sin of being born beautiful. As the malicious rumors fly about her, only Reanto recogonizes the pain and pathos in her eyes. Ms. Bellucci is silent for most parts but there is a searing undertone of suffering reflected in her eyes that speaks volumes. To put it simply, it is a film about innocence and its end.

Rating: * * +

Quo Vadis, Baby?

A fairly interesting but simple thriller, as a sister dwells into her sister's death. The protagonist, the crazy sister, is a detective photographer who is messed up as she cant find a man nor sleep and finds solace in some finely rolled hash. She cant find sleep because of the sister, who was also a crazy one and who maintained video journals recording the travails of her tumultuous life. Through the video journals, the crazy protagonist sister slowly gets closer to the truth.

The title of the movie is inspired by the 'The Last Tango in Paris' and is one piece of the puzzle. A fairly entertaining watch.

Rating : * * +

Stealing Beauty

October 21st, 2007
Lucy (Liv Tyler) travels to beautiful Italy to have her portrait done, chase the ghost of her mother and grasp the reins of love. Bernardo Bertolucci film is thick with sexual tension which shimmers like heat waves over the lush countryside. Liv Tyler dances around these waves in an Italian villa where a group of bohemian artists and friends have gathered to spend the summer. Jeremy Irons is poignant in his role of a dying playwright. But it is Tyler's ethereal beauty that captures the screen. You are often left wondering if it is film or phantasmagoria. For me the it was magical and it had nothing to with the film.

Rating: * * * *