If you're not doing anything important this weekend and you love art films, I strongly suggest you catch the screening (it's free!!) of La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty), the Italian movie that won this year's Oscar for Best Foreign Language FIlm, at the Italian Film Festival at the Shangri-la Mall!
I daresay it's the most beautifully photographed movie I've seen in years - Rome is just stunning - nganga talaga me in many scenes - especially that the movie brings out the best that Italy could offer the world in terms of history, artworks, fashion and natural beauty.
And that this movie has philosophical and political overtones makes it even more compelling, not that I understood all its philosophical musings or how the movie stands as a critic of the Berlusconi political era. I was content to just sit there and enjoy the delicious visual feast that this movie is!
I also love the haunting music that director used - the first scene which featured an operatic aria sets you in the mood and the last scene where you feel like you're the one in the boat making its way along the Tiber river while a melancholy piano piece plays in the background made me want to stay in the movie theatre just a few minutes more.
The movie also has an acerbic sense of humor which sent the audience I was with last night laughing at the sarcasm and the absurdity of many of the scenes. I especially enjoyed the scene where the half-naked actor finds the nun called "The Saint" sleeping on the floor of his bedroom!!
Plus, there are so many interesting characters in it! There's a dwarf, an aging stripper, penniless aristocrats, dirty old men (ooopppsss), lots of beautiful women (and lots of breast exposure too!), pretentious performance artists, and lots of priests and nuns (this is Rome after all, where the Vatican is)! Never a dull moment talaga.
The Filipino movie that most reminds me of this movie is the classic Richard Gomez - Dawn Zulueta movie Hihintayin Kita Sa Langit where the director used the stunning natural beauty of our country as the backdrop of his story. That's basically what Paolo Sorrentino (the film's director) does here in this movie - using Rome as the canvas of his story.
No comments:
Post a Comment