L'immensità

I love art house Italian films from the 1970s so I wanted to see L'immensita but I found myself underwhelmed. The film is pretty, but not beautiful. It's artful but not terribly interesting. The musical moments were lovely but did not uplift a claustrophobic tale about a 12 year old trans boy obsessed with his unhappy mother. The emphasis here is on the experience of late childhood and puberty, the suffering of a trans adolescent resisting their given gender role in traditional society, and there's little escape into the wider world of Rome in the 1970s beyond a tween's impression taken from movies and television.

The movie is mostly sad and boring, and while I sympathize with the director I guess I am just not the target audience here. Also, I felt that the mother's supposed mental illness was too understated, too subtle. I didn't get that she was crazy, just miserable and looking for joy where she could find it with her kids, as she certainly couldn't have it with her husband.

The movie projects a background history; that of an unhappy middle class family due to the careless and extremely restrictive character of the father. We see the older daughter, Adriana's rebellious attitude towards her father's loveless dominance and inability to care for his wife or children. When the movie starts, Adriana has already rejected her female, fragile and womanizing features. Adriana rejects everything that her mother is, but also looks after her since her father humiliates Clara, her mother . Gino also rebels and manifests his unhappiness by defecating around the house. The mother is evidently distraught and looking for ways to feel happy in a bland world which flows between drinking, smoking and her time with her children. A beautiful photography, a good script and very good acting of Penelope Cruz. Very realistic and plausible, beautiful in its own drama.

A Spanish woman (Penelope Cruz) marries an Italian jerk (Vincenzo Amato) that, after making her three kids, starts cheating on her. She tries to keep her marriage together and her kids oblivious of the drama she goes through, but the situation is so bad that even the kids realize that in their family love is just a word. One of the kids, Adri, is a girl that dreams to be a boy - and acts towards that, dressing like a boy and pretending to be called Andrea, not Adriana.

This is the starting point (you learn all this in the first five minutes) - but the story doesn't really go anywhere, it's just a collection of moments in the dissolution of a plausible family (my father and a lot of his friends were just like Felice - yes, women really had a very hard time in the 70s).

So don't watch this movie for the story, watch it for Penelope. She's amazing.

Overall I enjoyed this movie and it made some good points that leave the viewer to decide the meaning and implications for themselves .

It's an art film , there is not a specific plot or climax , instead it's just a series of events helping develop the characters and situation and dynamics . I loved this about it - they did not have some big unnecessary event to "tie " it all together - the beauty is in the subtle subtleties. The set and costume design was amazingly well done - music choice as well - helped you get into the time frame and understand societal implications of the various conflicts .

The LGBTQ+ aspect is obviously important and central , but I actually felt like the more central theme was overall internal conflict , feelings of being trapped and the dynamics between parents and children . Obviously these are portrayed through the LGBT influence in a tasteful and powerful way . I doubt the most interesting part of this however the dynamic between parent and child - mom and child / children specifically. I thought the most powerful line of the movie was "Andre " telling the mom that she is the parent and they are the kids .

The imagination scenes , ending included , really were well done and helped you come to the conclusion that you have to come to your own conclusions. . You can't leave with a definitive path going forward - instead just that both mom and daughter will keep fighting .

Worth the time for sure - Cruz was fantastic .

This movie is, for the admission of his on author, inspired to Crialese's childhood. I could feel from the beginning to the end the difficulty of Andrea to accept his body, the inability to watch himself on the mirror or to show himself shirtless in front of other. Some amusement helps counterbalance the heaviness of the family situation, I'm referring to the musical parts of the movie which are not only beautifully shot but help understanding how the central character would like to be seen by others, in contrast to what he sees looking at the mirror. Sure, this is not an action movie, you won't find a clear villain (although certainly the father does not come out well) or an ending, yet it kept me glued to the screen for the whole duration of the film.