Platicsco Good story, Not enough for a whole film

TaryBiggBall It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Usamah Harvey The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

robert-temple-1 This is a spectacular achievement, of a perfectly-judged fable whose every moment and every detail is successful. It was made on a shoestring (they even had to wheel the camera in a supermarket trolley because they could not afford a dolly), but the production values look like and feel like a big-budget movie. The cinematography is deeply intriguing, partially due to the use of a highly light-sensitive digital camera, which is able to film in dark and moody places by natural light. Davide Ferrario, the writer, producer and director, is a unique cinematic artist. It is insufficient to call him brilliant, and even the word 'inspired' seems too tepid to do him justice. I would prefer to call him 'a force', like the wind or the waves. This magical film captures a kind of metaphysical power of the imagination, which transforms reality in front of our eyes. All except one member of the cast were unknowns. The project was a huge risk. But the result is a complete triumph. The casting was perfectly judged, and the performers more than delivered the goods. The only one with experience, Giorgio Pasotti, says little because he plays a silent character, but evokes the character's inner being with total success. Even more astounding is the performance by Francesca Inaudi, and she is more than 'a natural', she is a 'supernatural', whose facial muscles were designed for film-making. Another star of the film is a bizarre and gigantic building in the city of Turin called 'the Mole'. It is one of the most mysterious film sets ever used, and what is more bizarre, it is all real. Nothing about this film is 'normal', thank God, since what is more boring than normality? And yet nothing is abnormal either, it is just that it is all happening in the imagination, which transcends the difference. Two stories intersect, like two intersecting light-cones in space-time, and from the crossing of their beams, brilliant and scintillating interference patterns emerge, and then the individual stories are re-directed and electrons and positrons spray out in different directions. The film is about a collision of two parallel universes. No, three. The third is us.

herjoch Very seldom Italian movies find their way on to German screens,so I was delighted to find this little gem,moreover in the original Italian,which gives it a special flavor."In the past films were more about places than about characters"- so tells the narrator near the films beginning.According to that, one of the main constituents is "La Mole" in Turine,at one time the highest building in Europe and now housing the film-museum of Italy.It's a magnificent building with spiral stairways and convoluted corridors and provides an adequate place for a story between reality and the world of cinema.The story is about a love-triangle reminiscent of the french "Nouvelle Vague"-there are parallels to "Jules et Jim" and to"A bout de soufflé" concerning the female lead.It is told in a feathery way and in its love for the old-school poetic film-making reminded me of "The science of sleep".It is a tragicomical reflection about the necessity of storytelling and the immortality of cinema.Almost everyone left the well crowded cinema with a smile on his face.So if you enjoy a poetic,fairytale-like movie take the opportunity and watch it.

sodawater52 This movie is totally charming. It is Italy's answer to "Amelie". The humor and romance keep you smiling and on the edge of your seat. Afterall the nerds finish first here. Lots of very modern backdrops and situations. This is a very fun story with a great ending. The movie is built on a story within a story within a story and is endless in it's interpretation of symbolism and our empathy with the characters live's. The two main characters are the misfits of society and somehow seem to find each other in spite of themselves. The absurd idea of the main character playing out his fantasies in real life from the inspiration of his works efforts are quite imaginative and constantly intriguing. To top it off, the story has a tragedy but the ending stays true for the romantic characters.

maisannes After Midnight (9 out of 10)Give me the Italian love of cinema and love of love over the French any day of the week, well, maybe 6 out of 7.Here we have a movie about movies shot on digital video with a genre plot and some postmodern reflexivism thrown in. In the hands of a certain French New Wave director whose name I refuse to type, who in fact has used all of these devices himself, these tactics would be used at times to alienate, to smirk, to nudge-nudge-wink-wink, and to create narrative distance or irony. Ferrario uses them for all their worth, but with a consistently joyful embrace of both his characters and his audience. It's as if all 95 minutes of Band of Outsiders were running through the Louvre and dancing the Madison.Any movie that keeps a smile fixed on my face from start to finish deserves a superior mark, even if it doesn't have the depth or reach of other movies I rank as highly.