Violet_Loves_Iliona
Joined Sep 1999
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Reviews7
Violet_Loves_Iliona's rating
I heard of this film when it first came out, but only came across it a couple of days ago in the weekly section at my videostore, so I eagerly took it home and watched it, but I just didn't think this film was anything special. A couple of the problems were: 1. "To be gay and Italian is the worst thing imaginable" (or something similar), was said several times by both Angelo and his sister, but I find this ridiculous... How about being Muslim and gay? Or even Anglo and gay? Straight Anglo men are much more sexually repressed than most (Continental) European men, even the somewhat homophobic ones... When I lived in Italy while studying at University, there were a few culture clashes I experienced, among them the way even totally heterosexual men are towards each other - it's not unusual for straight men to kiss each other hello, to sleep together in the same bed wearing nothing but underwear, and it's not weird for, say, a grandfather and grandson to walk together hand-in-hand when walking home from school, the park, etc.
From an Anglo perspective (I'm Australian, so my background is Anglo), what's the first thing we would think? Seeing an old guy holding a little boy's hand? The first thing that would pop into our head is "paedophile", turning it into something distasteful, and even after learning that there is nothing untoward going on, it would still make most repressed Anglo people uncomfortable to see it or to do it... For the two guys kissing each other hello and goodbye or two guys in bed together? We'd think "gay", or maybe "closet gay", turning it into something sexual in both cases, and once again, something distasteful/negative in the second example. Italians are much freer than we are, and there is still homophobia in Italy (as there is everywhere), but since when are Italians more homophobic or less free than Anglo people? I'd say they're much freer than us, if anything.
2. Given how similar the two languages are, why would Italian immigrants who have moved to Quebec, a French-speaking country, be speaking English and not French? Come to think of it, they barely spoke any Italian, either. It's especially odd that the parents didn't speak Italian at least some of the time, especially with each other. With the children, it's probably more understandable that they don't speak Italian, though it's much less understandable that they wouldn't speak French as their first language (though as I said, it would've been so much easier even for the parents to speak French than for them to speak English).
3. Why were ostensibly Anglo actors playing the two central Italian-Quebecois characters? Are there not Italian-Canadian actors in Canada good enough and available to play these roles? Answer: The only thing I can come up with is that this was a film made by Anglos for an Anglo audience. It's for this reason that it was in English rather than the more natural French, why Anglo actors play Italian roles and why nobody speaks a word of Italian other than one word ("omosessuale" = homosexual, though in those contexts I would have thought they'd say "finocchio", or something similar), and why it seems to be based on non-existent social norms, stereotypes they seem to have pulled out of the air just for this film.
For all of these reasons, I found this film to be a real disappointment, and I couldn't in good conscience recommend this film to anyone... I know how hard it can be to get a film made and what a labour of love most films are, but this film didn't seem to have any soul whatsoever. If anything, it just felt like bubblegum... and illegitimate, exploitative bubblegum, at that.
I'll give this three stars, which are for the actors who played the families, especially Angelo's mother and father, Ginette Reno and Paul Sorvino. Without them, I would have wanted to give this exploitative bubblegum this a fat zero.
From an Anglo perspective (I'm Australian, so my background is Anglo), what's the first thing we would think? Seeing an old guy holding a little boy's hand? The first thing that would pop into our head is "paedophile", turning it into something distasteful, and even after learning that there is nothing untoward going on, it would still make most repressed Anglo people uncomfortable to see it or to do it... For the two guys kissing each other hello and goodbye or two guys in bed together? We'd think "gay", or maybe "closet gay", turning it into something sexual in both cases, and once again, something distasteful/negative in the second example. Italians are much freer than we are, and there is still homophobia in Italy (as there is everywhere), but since when are Italians more homophobic or less free than Anglo people? I'd say they're much freer than us, if anything.
2. Given how similar the two languages are, why would Italian immigrants who have moved to Quebec, a French-speaking country, be speaking English and not French? Come to think of it, they barely spoke any Italian, either. It's especially odd that the parents didn't speak Italian at least some of the time, especially with each other. With the children, it's probably more understandable that they don't speak Italian, though it's much less understandable that they wouldn't speak French as their first language (though as I said, it would've been so much easier even for the parents to speak French than for them to speak English).
3. Why were ostensibly Anglo actors playing the two central Italian-Quebecois characters? Are there not Italian-Canadian actors in Canada good enough and available to play these roles? Answer: The only thing I can come up with is that this was a film made by Anglos for an Anglo audience. It's for this reason that it was in English rather than the more natural French, why Anglo actors play Italian roles and why nobody speaks a word of Italian other than one word ("omosessuale" = homosexual, though in those contexts I would have thought they'd say "finocchio", or something similar), and why it seems to be based on non-existent social norms, stereotypes they seem to have pulled out of the air just for this film.
For all of these reasons, I found this film to be a real disappointment, and I couldn't in good conscience recommend this film to anyone... I know how hard it can be to get a film made and what a labour of love most films are, but this film didn't seem to have any soul whatsoever. If anything, it just felt like bubblegum... and illegitimate, exploitative bubblegum, at that.
I'll give this three stars, which are for the actors who played the families, especially Angelo's mother and father, Ginette Reno and Paul Sorvino. Without them, I would have wanted to give this exploitative bubblegum this a fat zero.
