Paolo Virzì, who directed one of my favorites (Caterina Va In Città) and one I feel was extremely overrated (La Prima Cosa Bella) gives us most recently a romantic movie, Tutti i Santi Giorni. His romantic couple, Antonia (Thony) and Guido (Luca Marinelli), are nothing really out of the ordinary or anything we’ve not seen in other movies. He’s serious and brainy, she’s artistic and less stable, and their happy-go-lucky life together is marred only by their struggle to conceive a child. What makes this couple special is that they are real, and they are believable as a couple.
If you know me, you’ll remember that I whine incessantly about Italians, who with their obscene wealth of young, good-looking actors and actresses and for reasons I do not understand make way too few romantic movies. I like love stories. Who doesn’t like a movie with an attractive couple, genuine chemistry and honest emotions? (Do you have to be a chick to love a chick flick?) I can’t say enough good things about Thony and Marinelli, so expressive and genuine in their roles and so naturally likeable. They drew me in and made me care about them, investing my own emotions in their relationship.
I ask so little of a romantic story; I really just want to be made to believe that the feelings are real. I want to feel that the couple not only loves but knows and likes each other. I want to feel that it’s beyond a physical attraction, that there’s a true connection, and that’s what Virzì delivers with Tutti i Santi Giorni.
Tutti i Santi Giorni will be screened at New York’s Open Roads: New Italian Cinema in June at Lincoln Center.
I Love Italian Everything 