July 7, 2011
Nessuno mi puo giudicare (2011) **
Hollywood-style Italian comedy about a spoiled rich woman who finds herself destitute after her husband's death and has to pay his debts by becoming a prostitute. An uneasy mixture of cynical sophistication and saccharine sentimentality, more successful as a crowd-pleaser than a lucid exploration of Italian hypocrisy, machismo and sexist double standards. And despite its subject matter, it has no nudity at all. If this was English-speaking Hollywood movie, it would have been a huge international hit, in United States, in Italy and everywhere else. But because it's in Italian, it will only be a huge hit in Italy, and then Hollywood will buy the rights and re-make it as a racy rom-com starring Jennifer Garner and Owen Wilson.
La Bellezza del somaro (2011) *
Typical Italian comedy set in a country house in Toscany, full of cheating husbands, neurotic wives, spoiled children, big snakes, donkeys and pointless references to Sylvio Berlusconi.
Elles (2011) ***
Excellent film about a journalist (Juliette Binoche) researching an article about prostitution in Paris.
Et maintenant on va où? (2011) **
Lebanese drama about religious conflicts between Muslims and Christians in a remote little village. An uneasy mix of the serious and the comic.
Innocence (2011) *
Czech drama about a doctor falsely accused of seducing a 14-year-old patient, but guilty of equally serious sexual transgressions. Daring subject, conventional treatment.
Body (2011) *
Turkish drama about a porn actress trying to rebuilt her life. While the subject matter is daring, the treatment is ultra-conservative and moralistic, reflecting the pro-Islamist direction of the Turkish society circa 2011. Probably meant as an allegory about Turkey and the evolution of its society.
Operation Casablanca (2011) **
An Arab immigrant in Europe is falsely accused of being a terrorist. A black comedy from Switzerland.
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