come2whereimfrom In a word, weird form the outset. From the opening creepy noises and extreme visual stimulation to the random cuts and bizarre set pieces 'The Family Friend' is nothing if not captivating. Its directed superbly by Paolo Sorrentino, whose last film the 'The Consequences of Love' should give you some idea of his visual style and flair, add to this the great cinematography, brilliant use of music and the twisted central performance of Giacomo Rizzo as Geremia and you have a truly excellent if not a little disturbing movie which is part Lynch, Part Fellini and all original. Geremia is a seventy year old tailor which is actually a cover for the fact he is a loan shark. Lonely and sleazy he prays on the needy and during the loan deals poses as a family friend to surround himself with people. One such family borrows money for their daughters wedding and Geremia becomes self appointed helper and starts arranging things for the young couple. Eventually he falls for the bride to be, a winner of the local beauty pageant, and the film becomes a kind of beauty and the beast tale. She is the gorgeous young girl overly fond of dancing and he amongst other things is a seedy, beastly rapist. The films characters are pretty much all unredeemable and it comes across like an Italian 'League of Gentlemen' with its dark humour and strange set ups. The music adds to the weirdness by ranging from Anthony and the Johnsons to classical and country and western. Just like 'Hidden' from last year the film leaves loads of unanswered questions and loose ends but that adds to its deconstructed nature and doesn't detract in anyway from the main story. Its in the smaller things that this film shines like when everyone takes their own chairs to the beauty contest as 'the sponsor and provider of seats pulled out at the last minute' or how Geremia's carrier bag swings from side to side over his plastered arm as he waddles along in schoolboy short trousers. This film won't be to everyone's liking, it is almost certainly an acquired taste, but those that can get under its skin won't be disappointed and will love it for all its creepy eccentricities

tiarings This film is not the great piece of cinema many critics/ viewers seem to think it is or want it to be. It has the occasional effective moment/ sequence, and the use of sub-bass was quite original and evocative in the sound mix. However, it's essentially trying to be an art-house film with enough mainstream/generic or light-hearted moments to appeal to your average non-art-house-watching, can't-handle-it-too-grim-or-arty cinema goer. Therefore, it's hugely flawed. It's not really that dark, for instance, despite a bit of dark posturing, and the more likable/ morally "okay" characters win out in the film's irritatingly moral conclusion. The bonding between the bingo-playing old bat and the cowboy sidekick was almost sickening, and was completely unnecessary if the film wanted to maintain a vaguely black/amoral tone (which it did initially appear to be striving for). I personally find the Coen brother's work to combine humour and a an enjoyably surreal darkness far more effectively, and to maintain a more amoral tone. It does not bare comparison to Fellini at all, for one thing there's none of that crazy visual bravura in the mis-en-scene here, and most of time and there's a deeply middle-brow quality to narrative proceedings. Unlike the great Italian films of 60s/ 70s (Visconti, Antonioni etc) the film is quite uninterestingly shot most of the time, with an overuse of extreme close-ups and close-ups, and with a very standard sense of pace in the editing. To be honest, even Dario Argento is far more visually exciting.The inclusion of the thriller plot towards the end of film simply does not work that well, and feels contrived and somewhat unengaging: the film suddenly decides it no longer wishes to be a slightly arty character-study of a despicable old money lender and tries to be David Mamet to get the audience "on the edge of their seats" - it had the opposite effect for me ultimately. The supporting characters are rubbish - the cowboy friend is like something out of a bad "quirky" short film and the super model girl has no *beep* personality at all... The old woman who's addicted to bingo? God, it's almost Father Ted territory and without the madcap humour or silliness to make such stereotypes genuinely funny.Some of the music was quite well-used however, and it is still better than another moving/ funny film about the Holocaust or films about small boys and their relationships with wise old men who work in cinemas.

eeleclair I saw this movie in Italia, in original language. It is a repulsive fantasy for an old man, with an eccentric soundtrack and cool camera angles to make it look "arty." In every scene is a female sex object-- a girl's volleyball team, a beauty queen, a new bride, the mother of a newborn, a nude girl sunbathing, two hookers in a bubble bath-- for the main character to ogle, grope, penetrate or threaten. If you like to see a repulsive male lead exploit his way through a cast of females, this is the film for you. Nudity and sex can be done well, but there is no real plot here, just a sequence of grotesque scenes that make you want to walk out and shower after.

Daniel Britten Paulo Sorrentino's latest film confirms him as the Antonioni de nos jours. Beautifully shot with an intrusive and fascinatingly eclectic soundtrack, it is nevertheless irritatingly self-conscious and wilfully elliptical. A marvellous, almost Dickensian fable about a miserly loan shark who gets his comeuppance, is somewhat undercut by the director's own preoccupation with style.Geremia is a tailor/loan shark who lives with his invalid mother in a squalid apartment in small town Italy. One day, he is asked by a waiter to pay for the wedding of his daughter, Rossana (played by the goddess-like Laura Chiatti). Geremia instantly falls in love, and wastes no time in exploiting the situation for his own dark purposes. However, Rossana gives him more than he bargained for and in a sub-plot he is betrayed by his only 'friend', Gino.This is very much a film about appearances, and how deceptive they can be. Geremia, whilst grotesquely greedy and physically repulsive, offers some profound insights into what makes other people tick, if not himself. Rossana turns out to be the perfect foil for him, for while he has had to fight for every opportunity he gets, life has been handed to her on a plate. Ultimately they are both motivated, if not undone, by greed and pride in equal measure.Sorrentino, who directed the stylish but more superficial The Consequences of Love, is certainly developing a distinctive style of film-making. The question is whether he can achieve a more successful marriage of the flashy modern rock sensibility with what are fundamentally old-fashioned values in story-telling. It is something which others, notably Sofia Coppola, have recently tried to do, with equally mixed results.