Incantato

While this movie has some good moments, I found both the plot and the pace of the movie uneven to the point where I was not engaged in the movie for most of the time. The lead actor is talented, so talented and so convincing as the sweet, lonely, and socially awkward 35 year-old he plays - at points in the movie - you feel bored of him and tired of his introversion and immersion in ancient poetry. The leading lady, while beautiful, does not deliver a convincing performance. That role required an actor with a broader range and she falls flat. There are, however, scenes that made me laugh aloud and all of them featured the legendary Giancarlo Giannini.

As do other movies of Pupi Avati, Il cuore altrove (the heart elsewhere) deals with people searching for home – home meaning here not only a certain place on the geographical map but also in society and in the emotional landscape within.

A not so young man is sent from Rome to Bolognia with a clearly defined task: To find a woman who will produce an heir. He dutifully sets about to fulfill this task and also gets started in his job as a teacher of Latin and ancient Greek in a high school. He clearly is a misfit – and what's worse: a cultured one - who lives in a world of his own. As Avati explains in an interview on the DVD: He is one of those guys who always sing either too loud or too low – he will never make it into a choir (meaning any choir – this might serve as an explanation for the ending an other reviewer described as a head-scratcher).

At a dance for the blind in a monastery the not so young man meets a young, beautiful and glamorous woman – played convincingly by a Julia Roberts clone. He immediately falls in love with her and she, a temperamental and fickle soul, uses him in turn in an attempt to take revenge at the fiancé who jilted her after she lost her eyesight. The man is hell bent on marrying the woman who, as a dentist's daughter firmly integrated into Bologna's high society, seems to stand socially above him, disregarding all the sensible and well intentioned attempts to deter him. His is an absolutely quixotic enterprise that is bound to fail.

This short synopsis does not illustrate enough the kind hearted approach the director takes towards all the concerned characters and the mellow, consoling atmosphere created by the excellent cinematography and the backdating of the story to the first half of the 20th century. The story has a tragic ending but does not leave the main character without hope (but neither with a home). Very touching is the scene between him and his pupils as he tells them that he cannot stay on in Bologna (because of his delusion). Stay on, we will take care of you, they plead, and it really feels like it is meant that they will adopt him collectively. It struck me as being a typical reaction of young people who, with the innocence of their youth, think they can really improve the world and make a difference.

Once again in this movie Avati proves himself to be something of a master of unintentional cruelty – he really has a keen eye for the mechanics of the mind and the interaction between different people – and the mess they are bound to get into. In this aspect I detect a resemblance with the work of Woody Allen.

Il cuore altrove certainly isn't a movie for everybody's taste but in any case a rewarding experience with many funny and tragic moments.

Pupi Avati is one of the best current directors working in the Italian Cinema. He is an original. His stories are never boring and he has the talent to create a stir among his viewers.

There is a role reversal here. Nello, the young Latin and Greek professor, has never known love, nor has he pursued it before. He meets and falls in love with Angela, the rich society girl that is temporarily blind. Little does Nello knows what he is getting into. Angela wants a vendetta against the real love of her life, who has abandoned her, when she loses her sight, for another.

The irony of the story is that Nello, even though he can see, is in reality the blind one, and it is Angela, the blind one, who will go to extremes to use him until she achieves the revenge she wants, except that at one point, she comes to realize that Nello adores her, but it's too late because then all she wants is to go ahead with an operation that might restore her eyesight.

Neri Marcore, is perfect as Nello. He makes us believe he is the awkward and naive Nello. Giancarlo Giannini is Cesare, Nello's father, who cheats on his wife, shamelessly. Vanessa Incontrada is perhaps the weakest of the principals since it appears this is her first appearance in a film.

Pupi Avati delivers another film that is well crafted and makes one think.

in the 30s, a clumsy 35 years old professor of latin and humanities moves to Bologna, under the pressure of his parents (very important tailors in Rome, who work for the pope! they're disappointed by son's devotion to studies and unskillness with practical things) hoping he would eventually find a wife and settle family, giving them an heir to their fortune.

he is a very sensible and well-educated person, yet a kinda stranger in the real world. students are at first surprised by his manners, but then start to like him and his way of teaching, motivated from personal passion for classics.

his life changes when he meets a very exuberant pretty woman, who likes to enjoy life. What can make these two persons who are exactly the opposite one of the other close to each other? Actually she is blind and our guy the only one, with his sensibility, who can stand by her..but the thing is obstacled both from her parents (who thinks a school professor could not afford to give her the life standards she is used to) and his (who do not accept the fact she is blind). And she seems to be still in love wiht her previous boyfriend. will they finally come together?

a swiss doctor is trying hard new techniques to give her back the sight. Will she finally see again? in that case, what will change in their relationship, given the fact that was her blindness itself to make her notice him?

funny the first half, very touching the second part.

Pupi Avati has made a big job, and Marcorè is astonishly good in the role.

"Il cuore altrove" is a great film.

Great because it shows everyday life from extraordinary points of view.

Great because it tells about how ordinary people can do wonderful things, and shy people can be brave, in the name of love.

Great because it proves that you can put together a talented comic-cabaret actor (Neri Marcorè) and a showgirl (Vanessa Incontrada) and here it is: an unusual, but wonderful couple of actors for a surely unusual, but wonderful love story.

Great because it is able to convince you that very talented and experimented actors like Giancarlo Giannini or Giulio Bosetti are even more talented than you thought.

Great because it provides a touching insight of a town that everybody should be allowed to visit once in a lifetime.

Great because it makes you laugh and cry at the same time and very few films are still able to do it nowadays.

Even if, out of Italy, you won't be able to understand its spirit fully, please try to see it. You won't regret.