Author's rating:
Three elderly Romans from Trastevere, with an increasingly meager retirement prospect, decide to leave for some exotic country where they can live better. This is the plot of Far far di Gianni DiGregorio in his fourth work as a director. As we have written many times, it is not easy to comment on the Italian comedy, especially when she can no longer find her original soul that made her famous in the world. Moreover, in a moment of the season where the offer of quality is scarce where the moment of the "cinepanettoni" has also gone almost unnoticed, even though they have not had a particular fortune in cinemas (a case apart from Checco Zalone).
In this case Di Gregorio allows us a reconciliation: his genre, his very particular way of telling his Rome with images is always lucid, essential, measured as well as attentive and sensitive to the issues and problems that the country experiences. First of all the characters: the first is the director himself who, as usual, signs the subject and screenplay and is the protagonist. Then the late Ennio Fantastichini (recently passed away) and Giorgio Colangeli. Three figures who could not better represent that "Roman" spirit that could almost be considered a completely original cinematic genre.
It is a verbal language, of the body and of looks that make acting a typical model and perfectly convey the soul of a city and its best-known district, Trastevere, as best it could not be. We are talking about "schools" of theater and cinema such as, for example, the Neapolitan one which does not need to bother illustrious and well-known authors and actors. Di Gregorio has made all of this his stylistic hallmark, his trademark with which he has obtained the well-deserved acclaim that has brought him prestigious awards since his first film as a director Mid-August lunch of 2008.
The theme of this story is travel. It is a journey of people who already have a long journey behind them, now on the threshold of a mature third age trying to survive on what little they can get from a meager pension. The dream of a new life, in a different way, where one could live well with little seems to be possible. Then instead, first of all feelings get in the way together with the difficulties in setting up a common fund necessary to finance the trip and, finally, the bureaucratic difficulties. The beauty, the pleasure of a film like this is all in the ability to keep a wide range of feelings and sensations in perfect balance.
They are elderly people, alone and in need of affection, like many of the rest, but this does not arouse compassion. They are people in search of adventure and hope, but without worries and without illusions. They are people who "speak" softly, slowly, just like the images that scroll across the screen and in this way they show their great vitality. They are, simply, people who are easy to perceive as neighbors, similar to many of common knowledge.
There is only one limit to this film which, as we have written, is also its main merit: perhaps it is too much with a “romanocentric” trademark which instead, otherwise, would have made it of wider and surer interest. To see, without hesitation.
