User Reviews

Instead of giving minimal depth to multiple characters, why wouldn't you give more depth to the main characters? Most of the movie is confusing, as it's telling multiple stories at once, and all of it is disjointed really.

You got this story of kids playing wars, and then at the same time, the kids as adults living their lives. It's really hard to follow when you are telling me multiple stories at the same time.

The hour or so, nothing is happening, until the last 20 minutes. Sure, the movie's subject matter is disturbing, but if we knew more about our characters, and if we got a reason to care about them, except the fact that they are children, it would help a lot.

The last 30-20 minutes, is what kinda pulled this movie out of being completely pointless. As we understand who is the killer, it gives suspense to see the brother and friends fighting for his sister. And then we learn that the school teacher and the guy that's getting drunk are those two today.

The idea of the movie is good, but the execution is not. I wish I could rate it higher, but I can't. A lot of scenes could have been cut from this movie, and made into a short film, with more character depth that would help a lot. It's a movie trying to tell 3-4 separate stories, and it does not work.

Three troubled adults in contemporary Turin look back on the summer in the late '70s when their childhood – and their dreams – came crashing to an end. Children of poor immigrants from Southern Italy, 13-year-old Carmine, Sandro, and Cinzia spend their summer playing with their friends in and around the abandoned warehouse of a scrap metal company. Worldly-wise and adventurous, the children form their own little society, with budding bully Carmine the stick-wielding chief, and paramours Cinzia and Sandro parental figures to the youngest. When one of their number turns up murdered, the children spring into action – at first attacking the developmentally challenged man who interrupts their play, but then, after another child disappears, coming to understand that the murderer is a well respected adult whom their parents consider beyond reproach. And when Carmine's little sister goes missing, the children make moral choices that will scar them for life.

Valerio Mastrandrea, Stefano Accorsi, and Valeria Solarino are superb as the lost souls who, even in their 40s, have yet to find any grounding in their lives. Equally superb are Giuseppe Furlo, Giampaolo Stella, and Giulia Cocellatto as their younger selves. Filippo Timi is memorable as the local doctor whose a-Capella singing of opera arias will make your hair stand on end.

Watching Ruggine is a difficult experience. While the abuse and murder of children is kept off-screen, writer-director Daniele Gaglianone nevertheless has his camera linger, too long for the viewer's comfort, on images of adults and children that make more than just the murderer seem like potential abusers. The English-subtitled Italian DVD is rated "T," which is the equivalent of our "G" or "PG," but a minimum "R" would be required here – if this deeply disturbing film ever gets released at all.