Actually I should say good things about Zeffirelli. His Romeo and Juliet from 1969 opened for me the door to literature. I saw tgis movie as a boy and never again after that. I am almost certain that watching it now would ruin the experience. I have, however, enjoyed the wonderful score from the hands of Nino Rota several times.
I have also seen some of his monumental and at times rather vulgar opera productions - and now Tea with Mussolini.
I learnt today that Zeffirelli is not yet dead, so I am not obliged to say nothing but good about him.
It has been many times that even a superior cast cannot save a bad script. I have many doubts about this script. It seems that it is based on Zeffirelli's childhood memories. And although he obviously didn't have a very happy childhood, the message here seems to be: it wasn't so bad after all. Fascism was cozy, wasn't it? Yeah, there might have been some few incidents here and there, but nothing to be alarmed about. Why worry that you live in a dictatorship when the train run on schedule and the streets are clean.
We se much of fascism in this film, as if it was through the eyes of Lady Hester Random (Maggie Smith - as brilliant as always. I was only a little bit surprised that even then she very old. Same Judi Dench, as if they have been old the last few decades.
This film is supposedly about a boy, Luca, who is brought up by eccentric English ladies after his mother died. His mother never married and the father has no intention of taking care of the boy. These ladies are the focus of the film. There is not much plot, rather an anecdote-driven story line. The boy appears occasionally, but it never becomes a story about coming of age. It seems that the director relied too much on strong performances of the leading ladies. Every other aspect had been neglected.
I would watch it only, if I needed to kill some time and there was absolutely nothing else to do.
6/10
I have also seen some of his monumental and at times rather vulgar opera productions - and now Tea with Mussolini.
I learnt today that Zeffirelli is not yet dead, so I am not obliged to say nothing but good about him.
It has been many times that even a superior cast cannot save a bad script. I have many doubts about this script. It seems that it is based on Zeffirelli's childhood memories. And although he obviously didn't have a very happy childhood, the message here seems to be: it wasn't so bad after all. Fascism was cozy, wasn't it? Yeah, there might have been some few incidents here and there, but nothing to be alarmed about. Why worry that you live in a dictatorship when the train run on schedule and the streets are clean.
We se much of fascism in this film, as if it was through the eyes of Lady Hester Random (Maggie Smith - as brilliant as always. I was only a little bit surprised that even then she very old. Same Judi Dench, as if they have been old the last few decades.
This film is supposedly about a boy, Luca, who is brought up by eccentric English ladies after his mother died. His mother never married and the father has no intention of taking care of the boy. These ladies are the focus of the film. There is not much plot, rather an anecdote-driven story line. The boy appears occasionally, but it never becomes a story about coming of age. It seems that the director relied too much on strong performances of the leading ladies. Every other aspect had been neglected.
I would watch it only, if I needed to kill some time and there was absolutely nothing else to do.
6/10
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