Beyond Love

Beyond love is a good film. It has rhythm, plot and certain doses of simplicity, that help us feeling sympathetic towards the film. It has some moments of soap opera, something we Brazilian loves. The come and goes of the story can maintain the viewer attempt to what is happening. I found the bond between the two main characters, one gay and another lesbian, somewhat exaggerated, but that doesn't destroy the film.

Stefano (Marco Gandolfi Nannini), the gay hunk that that helps Marina (Jessica Resteghini), the hot lesbian, may go too beyond the limits a person in helping his friend, but it helps the development of the story, and make us reflect up to where should a friendship goes. As a hole, I would say the film functions, and is a good entertainment mixing emotions, happenings and reflection a quick pace.

I'm fairly sure this movie will never make it to the English-speaking market (and they are none the poorer for it), but since this is an English forum I'll write accordingly. The film centers around four pretty boring friends; two gay, two lesbian. Though they all are supposedly in love after years together and spend vast amounts of time having sex, they are all very self-absorbed, shallow and easily provoked to rage over the slightest altercation or new revelation about each other. The film does seem to show an accurate portrayal of lesbian relationships in Italy; high in DRAMA, petty squabbles and a constant obsession over who will get pregnant (the exception being the aforementioned "vast amounts of time having sex" part...that is fantasy). However, for the most part it's just drawn out, repetitive (the different "jobs" Stefano takes on just got laughably dull) and extremely cliché. After 2 hours of drama, none of the characters comes off likable. You could most likely get the same effect of watching this movie by putting 4 stray cats in a room and watching them howl and fight each other...and you'd have wasted less time.