First-run movies: Spielberg's Adolescence and Pinocchio del Toro

Steven Spielberg, with his long-awaited autobiographical drama «The Fabelmans» and Guillermo del Toro's «Pinocchio» are the only ones who could perhaps take on the World Cup, which is in full swing. In addition to the above two films, Luca Guantanino's unconventional romantic horror drama «Bones and All» and Disney animation «Strange World» also premiere tonight. Also showing is «The White Pigeon», which was the 1960 debut of Francisek Vlachil.

The Fabelmans

Drama film, American production of 2022, directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, Seth Rogen, Gabriel LaBelle, Jeannie Berlin, Julia Butters, Robin Bartlett, Killie Karsten, Jude Hirsch and others.

Steven Spielberg, one of cinema's greatest storytellers and certainly its most commercial director, with huge and artistic successes, half a century after his first film, decided to bring his teenage years to the big screen. So, 51 years after «Duel», a low-budget thriller starring Dennis Weaver and a scary... truck, where he emphatically showed his source talent, he decided to make a film about his love affair with cinema since his childhood.

A long-awaited film that had created huge expectations among his fanatical fans and especially among all those who had adored his early years, before he became a regime, a businessman and a digger. The creator of such masterful films as «Close Encounters of the Third Kind,» «E.T. The Alien», «Jaws», the incredible adventures of Indiana Jones and later the Oscar-winning «Schindler's List», working with Pulitzer Prize-winning Tony Kushner, with whom he had previously collaborated on «Munich» and «Lincoln, he co-wrote the screenplay for the film, A coming-of-age story about family events that marked his adolescence and personality, but also to send a message of love for cinema.

In this, his 34th film, the now 75-year-old Spielberg, armed with an interesting story about a family in disarray, as his mother, a light-hearted and passionate artistic nature, is estranged from his father, a pioneering computer engineer, a low-key man, an IT pioneer, perfect for an employee, but completely uninterested in a woman. About a family trying to straddle the line between Jewish orthodoxy and modernity, between fake happiness and the rift between the couple - something that little Sammy (a young Spielberg) discovers in a film clip he took on an outing, a pivotal moment in the film, but also semiotically about the power of cinema to highlight truth, but also to conceal or distort it. A family that moves because of the father's job, which creates further problems as the family tree cannot take root, and there are always the amorous weeds lurking, besieging the mother, whom young Sammy overlooks.

Also, the film is to some extent a tribute to the teacher John Ford. The first film that young Sammy sees and is enchanted by is Ford's masterful western The Man Who Killed Liberty Valance, and the film ends with the great director's evocative presence giving advice to the now young Spielberg - one of the film's most iconic moments that will delight cinephiles.

However, Spielberg, although he makes a pretty good film and will most likely knock on the Oscar door again, shows weaknesses and seems rather below the expectations he had created. His film features some stunning anthology scenes that once again demonstrate his directorial gifts, with co-director of photography Janus Kaminsky and editing by Sarah Broseur and Michael Mann and of course John Williams on music. It will at one point convey the changing times, with the advent of new technologies, affluence, to anyone who believes in and fights for the «American dream», psychoanalysis, a fad that would dominate the US in the decades to come, but also widespread religious hypocrisy and the racism that permeated American society (because of his Jewish heritage Sammy would take a beating in college). He would not, however, do the same in other particularly important areas of his film and especially going against the principles of John Ford and the other greats of cinema. First and foremost, he blathers on unnecessarily, increasing the length of his film to two and a half hours, as the film would have been more imposing and effective if it had been reduced by much. Moreover, his babbling weakens the emotion that Spielberg is legitimately aiming for, but really the touching moments are few and far between, as are the glimpses of a humour that doesn't always work and probably only caters to the average American audience. Add to this the absence of any reference to the era, to «Cold War» America, a country living in huge contrasts and then, to the disappearance of any social reflection, and you easily realize that Spielberg is talking about the creative and restless time of his life, through the eyes of a man who has changed a lot since his youth, he has become a man of particular power, with a lot of money and his heart constrained by his business mind. Thus, paradoxically, Spielberg's Achilles' heel turns out to be Spielberg's strongest attribute, which is none other than his storytelling ability.

Nevertheless, let's not grumble, it's a film that has its merits, an interesting if uneven story, has shots and scenes of rare beauty and will give a pleasant evening, especially to those who leave the demands and standards for a Spielberg outside the cinema, whom we will be waiting for at some point, until he leaves the set, to remind us of that director from the early years of his career, when he, in the 1970s, along with Coppola, Scorsese, De Palma and the other guys, changed the course of American cinema.

Michelle Williams’ (of the four Oscar nominees) performance as the mother is captivating and will probably be among the Academy Award nominees for Best Actress again, while Gabriel LaBelle, as young Sammy and Paul Danno, who plays the father, are merely adequate. Both Ginny Berlin (the bitter Jewish grandmother) and Jude Hirsch, as the beastly uncle, stand out conspicuously in supporting roles.

In SOFT WORDS... Growing up in Arizona after World War II, young Sammy Feibelman discovers a shocking family secret and discovers how the power of cinema helps him deal with the truth.

Pinocchio by Guillermo del Toro

(“Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio”) Animated fantasy film, American and Mexican production of 2022, directed by Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson.

Goldoni's classic tale has been adapted to the big screen several times, following Disney's classic animated film, without much success, as in most cases they tried to match the creation of the famous producer and director.

Here, Oscar-winner for The Shape of Water Guillermo del Toro, in collaboration with Mark Gustafson, avoids the moulds and spirit of the Disney mastermind, as he essentially makes a free adaptation of the classic. Aimed mainly at adult audiences, it is about life and death, melancholy and wonder, the power of love and even the threat of fascism, as the story is set during the Mussolini era. And all this always with a playfulness.

Del Toro's imagination runs wild, Goldoni's text gives him room for creativity and apt social observations, while each character is well thought out and has his or her own interest. The Mexican director has chosen to film in dark tones while possessing an incurable optimism, and he is effectively aided by Alexandre Despla's music and pleasant songs. The film's effectiveness is greatly contributed to by the stunning graphics, the inspiring original sketches, while the puppets acquire a soul and convey waves of emotions.

Our little friends will also love the film, even if they don't always «get» the deeper meanings, while it is certainly a unique production far away from the silly animation that flood the screens and perhaps a model that could make us forget Disney. On the plus side, the film also features the voices lent to the characters by acclaimed actors Ewan McGregor, David Bradley, John Turturro, Ron Perlman and Kate Blanchett.

IN SOFT WORDS... The story of a wooden puppet who comes to life and becomes a real boy in 1930s fascist Italy.

Bones and All

Horror film, American and Italian production of 2022, directed by Luca Guadagno, starring Timothy Salame, Taylor Russell, Mark Rylands, Jessica Harper, Andre Holland, David Gordon Green, Francesca Scorsese, Michael Stuhlberg and others.

An unconventional romantic horror film that combines a couple's young love with drama and a coming of age story. Luca Guantanino («Call Me by Your Name», «Suspiria») is again based on a literary text, that of Camille de Angelis, which concerns a story of violent coming of age, the difficult period of socialization, the search of young people to find their identity, and diversity.

18-year-old Maren and her slightly older brother Lee are wandering cannibals and have understood and hidden their deadly habit since childhood, living in the anger and rejection of their families.

Cannibalism, allegorically, is now spreading as a common virus in Western, mainly Western, societies. It's a brilliant idea from Guadantino, as he places it in the iconic 1980s era marked by Reagan and Reaganism, but it remains almost unrealized, confining it to his own obsessions, while at the same time the film suffers from infantile cinematic maladies. The unwarranted parrying of the heroes, with wooden dialogue between the pair that never acquires the proper chemistry, the slow pacing, the sometimes excessive splatter.

His film ends up as a long, sometimes charming, romantic road trip for teenagers, interrupted by erratic scenes of horror and undermining the interesting and indeed allegorical messages for which the Italian director apparently made the film.

Salame may be charismatic and captivating to the camera, but he seems rather unprepared to cast his heavy shadow in the film, the traits the role demands, and all that remains is his teenage good looks. The performance of the likeable Taylor Russell is anemic, and the most frightening thing the film possesses is the evocative performance of the experienced Mark Rylands.

IN LITTLE WORDS... Maren, a young woman learning how to survive on the fringes of society, and Lee, an extreme and deprived adventurer, meet and join in a mile-long odyssey that takes them through the byways, back alleys and traps of Ronald Reagan's America. But despite their best efforts, all roads lead back to their terrifying pasts and to a final stop that will determine whether their love can survive their differences.

The films are still being shown:

Strange World

(“Strange World”) A well-crafted, but conventional, uninspired, children's animated film, signed by Disney and director Don Hall of the successful animations «Raya and the Last Dragon», «Viana», etc. A great exploration adventure that has an old-fashioned charm, the familiar ecological messages and the symbiotic motif, but without having anything special and just settling for brightly colored and some good scenes. Three generations of the legendary Clade family of explorers will find themselves in uncharted and dangerous territory where mythical creatures lurk. The film is dubbed in Greek, with the voices of Vangelis Stratigakos, Yannis Stefopoulos, Konstantinos Klaydianos, Georgina Karahalios, Stefania Goulioti, Angelos Liagos, Andreas Evangelatos, Iris Pantazara, etc.

The White Pigeon

(“The White Dove”) The directorial debut (1960) of the genius Bratislav Vlacil, which defined the style of the filmmaker and influenced a generation of directors in Czech cinema and other European countries. Vlacil («Marquette Lazarova,» «Valley of the Bees,» «Adelaide») makes his directorial mark with a black-and-white poetic allegorical film about his heroes' search for freedom and introspection, using as his storyline a carrier pigeon that is lost on its journey to Germany when a disabled boy from Prague shoots it for target practice. Played by Karel Smitsek, Katerina Irmanova, Vyacheslav Irmanov.