In Buddhism there are three poisons that can pollute the soul of human beings: anger, ignorance and greed. When it happens that an individual enters one or more of these evil labyrinths, to get out or get rid of it, it is possible that one wants to pay a price. It may happen that one has to make a compromise with one's morality or give up part or all of one's nature, or one's own conscience.
This is the red thread of film "The place", from a few days in theaters signed by Paolo Genovese. It is a complex, articulated, difficult cinematographic story. A mysterious man, excellent Valerio Mastrandrea, occupies the same table in a bar (run by the always beautiful and talented Sabrina Ferilli) where he meets people who make him want to make apparently impossible or at least very difficult desires come true. In exchange for the possible solution, he asks him to do something violent and dramatic. Everyone accepts the diabolical pact but they won't always be able to complete the task.
The different characters (the cast is excellent: from Marco Giallini to Alba Rorhwacher, Vittoria Puccini, Rocco Papaleo and others) take turns to pose their difficulties and their hopes but, above all, highlight their loneliness. This is a possible interpretation of the film, also suggested by images and sequences that strongly recall some paintings by the American painter Edward Hopper where references to metropolitan loneliness and desperation are frequent.
Everyone is the architect of their own destiny or, to quote Salvatore Quasimodo better, “Everyone is alone in the heart of the earth pierced by a ray of the sun, and it is immediately evening”, and with this vision the characters that alternate on the screen perfectly represent the dramas that each individual, at one time or another, is forced to face and resolve sometimes having to reach a compromise. How far, however, can one raise the bar of one's own morality? What can be the insurmountable limit of one's conscience? Everyone has their own perimeter within which it is difficult to enter and, even more so, to judge that of the others.
"The place" takes up well the narrative figure of Genovese's previous success, "Perfect strangers", where the whole story takes place in a single environment and where the quality of the story is entirely theatrical, entirely entrusted to the expressive abilities of the actorsto the validity of the texts. From this point of view "The Place" holds up well, the script is compact even if it sometimes makes the development of the individual events excessively screwed up.
In the often bleak panorama of Italian cinema which appears taken by excessive self-referentiality, this film deals with a universal theme with a global language. To be seen with pen and paper, exactly as the protagonist does when he meets his "clients" and always has a large notebook in front of him where he writes down questions and answers.
“The place”, presented at the recent Rome Film Festival, is taken from an American TV series “The booth at the end” (translatable as the toll at the end of the ride) which seems to have had some success in recent years and has recently become visible in Italy as well. It is one of the few times that a film is based on television and not vice versa. However, everything is drawn from real, real, lived life, which always remains the greatest cinematic spectacle. It may not be to everyone's liking, but it certainly deserves attention.
