Tommaso

Easy on the eyes, heavy on the heart. Well worth my time, this story continues to give well after viewing and brings up interesting questions in oneself.

This movie felt like life. Everything's so natural and yet so complicated, even delirious, painful. I loved the sensuality of the shooting, the music is magnificent. Dafoe acting is magnetic, you forget that you're watching a movie. There are some brilliant moments, naturalistic parts, like when he yell at the drunk or when he's about to sleep with the blond woman he met at the AA. And ultimately it allowed me to visit Rome again, it brought me beautiful and painful memories.

If you dig a bit you find this is a semi-autobiographical film of the writer-director's life. In fact the young wife and young daughter are actually his real life wife and daughter. I really looked forward to seeing this as it has Willem Dafoe in the title role as Tommaso. And he in fact does justice to the role. The problem is the movie in total is not that interesting. It contains lots of stilted language and long monologues but basically is a story of a man, an actor and writer, living in Rome and working to overcome his addictions and balance life with a much younger wife that seems to be losing interest in him. I suspect this is the kind of movie that film students and critics love but most viewers of mainstream movies will not warm up to. I managed to find it on the Kanopy streaming movies site via my public library's subscription.

Interestingly I note that in most of the reviews here, reviewers didn't get that this movie is an autobiography of Ferrara, written and directed by himself, having his good friend Defoe playing his own role, his wife and daughter acting themselves. Ferrara and Defoe have been living in Rome for years, in the same area in the historical centre ('esquilino') where it happens I live one block away from him! I often seen him in the street with or without wife and kids, and he actually goes to the shops and bars you see in the movie (caffé Merulana 81, small organic grocery store, etc...) where you see the actual owners acting themselves. I have never talked to him, but I have always been wondering about his life here and away from here. So I was delighted to see this movie. I found the acting of Defoe stunning, he absolutely hold the movie and its tension, and I am sure his great friendship with Ferrara make it even more transcendent. I found it the very intimate story of a man exposing his sins and weaknesses, embracing them, in the later period of his life. Photography is minimalistic, probably taken with a very reduced team and preparation. It still serves well the intended pace and ambient of the story. So to me a very good, original, autobiographical movie, destinated for an informed and prepared audience.