Reviews

Sorrentino suggests a complex history, probably too much to be treated as raw material in the manner of the comic Tarantino. It 'a problem of linguistic register that plagues the film, which does not form differs little from the content. Missing, as it did of the previous films, the inseparable link between the images and the underlying meaning of the story is the poetry. Sorrentino is a master in the representation of existential emptiness, inability to communicate, the discomfort of contemporary living in a global society and devitalized, which also he made but where is not found, indeed, to be exact, where he feels inadequate. The shots are always essential, therefore, made of geometric architecture and empty, and almost metaphysical hyper-realist, then here is the succession of supermarkets, shopping malls, escalators, a futuristic flying bridge over the heads of men and houses. This explains the predilection sites for aseptic and soulless as the 'Switzerland colorless in "The consequence of love", the repulsive fascist architecture of Latin America in "The Family Friend", the insignificant reality in the province of Ascoli novel "They are all right," the chilling anonymous motels inland U.S. and so on. Even the protagonist of "This Must Be The Place" moves in similar places, so much so that Ireland and the United States does not have a recognizable identity: the sites of action does not belong to any particular place, and the mall , as well as the country overwhelmed by highway interchanges and overpasses, could be either in any suburb in the world. The rock stars of the film is called Cheyenne, but in reality is Robert Smith, the leader of the Cure although Sorrentino uses the character as a figure of the collective imagination and adapts it to his purposes in making the protagonist of an adventure as any hero comics. Certainly, the director may have been attracted by the figure of Smith for the close relationship with some of these films as David Lynch's "Twin Peaks" and "Muholland Drive" which prefigured the dark scene. Cheyenne leads an empty life, on the brink of despair, made darker by guilt, symbolized by the trolley that accompanies any of its activities, was to do the grocery shopping, or more properly to travel. When you meet the inventor of the trolley, you will also find the right clue leads him to seek out the hiding place of his father's Nazi torturer and the film draws to its conclusion. During the confession of the German shows that even this man pulls his weight, his sense of guilt to be expiated. The story then acquires a universal, with biblical references also about the human condition: each pulls its weight, everyone is on the brink of the precipice and we must persevere in the search for salvation, and atone for his guilt. Only then will the catharsis can take place and start the regeneration. It 'obvious that requires a lot of meat to cook sublime skill to be properly represented without running the risk of slipping and falling into banality. Sorrentino does his best, but in the end is a certain feeling of coldness and cleavage. However, only three minutes on the scene in which David Byrne makes imperative the movie.

A solid legal thriller that pushes little consolation to more than a reflection on the nature of imperfect justice. The justice that triumphs in the film is that of the State, the "reasons of state", a justice, therefore, very different from that of men is basically a moral and ideological. The originality of the film is, in my opinion, not so much emphasis on the scandal of a reason to assert that the State does not hesitate to trample the truth and civil rights, but rather in alerting the impossibility of judging the moral behavior of men. The film, in hindsight, the final two: the first, which concluded the trial of the conspirators, with its death sentence, and the second where you tell the story of a son who cowardly, but may, does nothing to prevent the condemnation of the mother. This poor figure is the real scandal of the story because his guilt, especially morality, and despite the evidence self-incrimination which is perceived by public opinion, can not be recognized because of insufficient evidence and is likely to remain unpunished. One more reason to reflect on the nature of the law far from perfect, far from regular and satisfy justice in accordance with the wishes and aspirations of men, actually reveals his true vocation as a full subservience to the state. It, like politics, morality and does not know, just like politics, too many times is incomprehensible to men.

Through grainy images, rarely vivid, winds up the story suspended between reality and aspirations, including guilt and neurotic acts of rebellion. Bellocchio seems to be the refusal of the fate that inevitably is well marked. There is a stage that includes the unconscious, the present, but the vanity of the reason for pulling them back, put him to rest. Never completely, though: the torment of life haunts everyone. Difficult to extricate themselves, bear the losses that do not make up their illusions. It would take a director to bring some 'order of life, suggesting some way out. In fact, it is the administrator of the family in the beautiful metaphor of man in a tuxedo that elegantly leaves the stage - and life - drowning in the waters of the pristine river of Bobbio, to warn that before the mystery of time is the life, man is granted only the dignity of courage, coming back just to water where life had begun. A film in some ways poignant, poetic, which tells the malaise of life through psychic impressions of the characters from within, in the course of the unstoppable memory over time which is the substance extremely fragile existence.

From the bed of the psychoanalyst of the fortuneteller glass ball. It is time of budgets for Woody Allen and the New York filmmaker is a bitter budget, just tempered by usual irony, moreover increasingly refined and detached. A comedy mild to tints drop shots on cynicism of our times, where one can only smile of the vicissitudes of the characters who see inevitably fail their projects. Contemporary man remains victim of his presumption and cynical merciless powered by himself. There is no escape for this humanity lost and desolate: wisdom, seems to suggest Woody, is accepting only the seductive power of illusion. And if illusion should be, then better than cheap and free-range of fortuneteller that the most expensive and ostentatious of psychoanalyst.

Xavier Beauvois tells the heroic sacrifice of seven missionaries Cistercian French in Algeria, the victims in 1996 of fundamentalist terrorism, and does so with great sense of proportion, without giving anything to the rhetoric. The film has in fact the rigors of monastic life, the film is stripped, essential, never abundant, as are the dialogues. That of the monks is a path already marked, nevertheless, with some hesitation human, their journey continues up to the extreme coherent. Their moral force solidifies in lived experience, which turns into a prolonged spiritual exercise. The earthly life is sacrificed, but there is no complacency in this choice: Do not chase and do not suffer, in fact, the appeal of martyrdom, intended only to affirm themselves ideally as free spirits. This is why their example is beyond the scope of religion, within which also mature, but addresses across all men because what it expresses is the need to affirm the value of human dignity and leads to the universal feeling of human solidarity. And 'this is their real strength, the moral freedom of the spirit, the power inherent in each man is to preserve the conscience of each submission.