Ovosodo (1997)

Absolutely Fantastic

A Major Disappointment

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

A sincere inspection of a young boy's rite-of-passage of becoming a man (symbolically the film ends with his marriage and his child on the way of birth) under the backdrop of Italy from 1980s to 1990s, Wielding a passionate and rightful narrative to chronologically chart the young protagonist's adolescence and cleave to the historical sensibility of the mise-en-scène. From the highly rated Italian writer/director Paolo Virzì, HARDBOILED EGG is his third feature- length film, and it won Grand Special Jury Prize and Little Golden Lion awards in Venice Film Festival 1997, which was Virzì's steady stepping stone to send him as one of the most eminent contemporary Italian directors, although his repute is chiefly exclusive in his homeland.The film is sturdily underpinned by a brilliant script, in which everything is petty but can render us sincere evocations of everyone's own pubertal trajectory. Simultaneously the cast is precisely neck and neck to their characters, the average-looking Edoardo Gabbriellini is a comforting discovery as our cipher Piero (who had matured abruptly alluring and 12 years later he was at ease with performing Tilda Swinton's inamorato in IO SONO AMORE 2009), the notoriously non-talent Nicoletta Braschi (Mrs. Roberto Begnini) contributes a quite impressive enaction as the ill-fated teacher whose dismal life is both subtle and palpable. A sensual Marco Cocci, Piero's classmate from a filthy rich family, steals all the thunder whenever presented, which could also be interpreted as an allurement to test Piero's sexual preference. Also a pop-crammed soundtrack and a colorful palette also suit the theme. What the film lacks in an epiphanic moment which could escalate the feel-good consciousness into a more abiding esteem, still it is a wonderful finding for me and for the contemporary Italian film industry as well.

I AM NOT SURE... It could be interesting for Non-Italians as a cultural anthropological research project, but, as for me, it was painful to watch. It portrays the Italian "Coming of Age" phenomenon extremely well, so well that I felt sick at the thought of how unhappy and deceived people can allow themselves to be. In fact, I do not hate the movie itself, but the moral condition Italy is in, and that this flick reveals so well.

This is one of my favourite movies all the time.It's funny but sad, it's sweet but satiric...talks about family, young people, loneliness and friendship, it's got hope for the future, though it's hopeless...I give it 10/10, definitely.

At a first glance Ovosodo is the same old film about coming of age in a shanty town, growing up in a rough area in a poor and exploited family, then, like in medieval frescos, the plot turns the attention to the panorama behind, to the social condition that tends to make necessary every choice. Ovosodo is a comedy but deeply rooted in a language and in a peculiar red-neck culture.