Get a Region Free DVD Player – Week 1 – La Nostra Vita

One of my FacebookI Love Italian Movies Pagefollowers brought up region free DVD players and movies that you need one to watch – which is most of them – and I’ve decided to start talking about them a little more. I own an embarrassing number of Italian DVDs but most of them are PAL zone 2, which means they can’t be played on American DVD players. Right now I have 2 of them, a little portable Colby and a regular one made by Phillips that is on it’s last leg and I’m expecting my new Samsung to arrive in a few days. They’re cheap – the portable one was $99 and the Samsung cost $60. If you love European movies they are worth every penny.

Just so you know, I think the cheaper ones are actually better because the makers of them don’t seem to have the same ethical dilemma about making DVD players zone free. I was surprised when I saw that my regular one was a Phillips because that company has given me nothing but trouble with the portable ones. They won’t ship them region free and they won’t help you change them.

Anyway, I’m going to begin a series of entries about movies that you’ll need the region free DVD player for, once a week and I’m calling it “Get a Region Free DVD Player“. Hopefully people will be convinced to get one. I’ve chosen one for the first week for no particular reason, I just happen to have recently rewatched it. It’s called La Nostra Vita, Our Life, and the zone 2 version is available through Amazon.

I liked “La Nostra Vita” for a few reasons. First, the acting is really good. Starring Elio Germano, who you may have seen in the American movie “Nine” with Daniel Day Lewis, and Isabella Ragonese, who I’ve raved about more than once here ( Nuovomondo, Un Altro Mondo, Dieci Inverni ), it even has by Raol Bova in a supporting role, and Stefania Montorsi from Dillo Con Parole Mie.

Writer/director Daniele Luchetti tells a story of real people. Many of the movies that I love are filmed in pretty touristy places – the historic center of Rome, Milan, and Venice, but La Nostra Vita is filmed where people really live – in crappy apartment buildings in the suburbs. They have real problems and real emotions – when Claudio sings at the funeral it’s hard for me to believe that what he is expressing is not really happening.

And the story is a very interesting psychological study of what transforms a person when the life he thinks will last forever suddenly ends. What is he capable of doing, the good and the bad?
clip #1 Cannes 2010 IN COMPETITION Daniele Luchetti.

This is a 2010 movie and may come available to us for our DVD player, but in the meantime, to see this and other excellent Italian movies, get a zone free DVD player!