Duse

As a non-Italian viewer, I expected to learn more about Eleonora Duse, but the storytelling was so muddled and opaque that I ended up frustrated rather than enlightened.

Valeria Bruni Tedeschi is undeniably intense. I imagine even ordering a cappuccino in real life, her glacier-blue eyes and expressive face would make it feel like a theatrical moment. Now picture two hours of that intensity with the camera practically glued to her-it's overwhelming. I found the overacting grating, especially given how underdeveloped the characters were. Disappointing.

I like Noémie Merlant, and she delivers her lines in Italian (though it's unclear whether she was dubbed), but her character-Duse's daughter-is sadly just as thinly written. A missed opportunity.

Duse by Pietro Marcello is a cinematic elegy, not a biography. It's a spiritual, searching portrait of the last years of Eleonora Duse, rendered not through factual reconstruction but through poetic immersion. Valeria Bruni Tedeschi delivers the performance of her life, embodying an artist who lived only through her art - even at the cost of her health, her daughter, her dignity. Marcello frames her not as a historical icon but as a myth in motion, caught between stage and sacrifice. The encounters with Sarah Bernhardt and D'Annunzio are not mere historical episodes, but echoes of a larger conversation between art and power, between presence and legacy. The film is a meditation on what it means to give oneself entirely to the stage, when even love and politics are no match for the sacred fire of performance. Best suited for reflective viewers, theater lovers, and anyone drawn to stories of uncompromising artistic devotion. Watch it when you seek answers to the unresolvable question: what would you give up for what you believe in?