Padre Padrone

Rating:
Summary: Fox Lorber DVD...experience the worst DVD transfer
Review: a true story, about living under unbelievable paternal cruelty. the landscape must be beutiful, but this dvd transfer manages to obscure all that. this is the type of product you get when vulgar and dishonest people are involved in its making; this becomes more apparent when it involve the production of art-related materials, where ultimate crftmanship is required. I hope that a remastered version well be published sometimes in the future. avoid this dvd and all Fox Lorber dvd.

Rating:
Summary: MY FATHER , MY MASTER...
Review: Here is a landmark film of the seventies , a film with a great dramatic intensity , it has its roots in neo-realism yet so beautiful and lyrical. The 5 stars are for Paolo and Vittorio Taviani , Omero Antonuti and the rest of the crew. For Fox Lorber a zero on a transfer job so poorly done , the VHS tape plays better; they did the same with "Ran" , by Kurosawa . Let us hope someone will hear our voices screaming bloody murder , and hoping for a decent digital transfer on these and similar "butchered" masterpieces.

Rating:
Summary: A classic.
Review: Ignore Maltin. He's out of his league when it comes to reviewing movies of any substance or ambition. This is an unbelievably powerful story of an illiterate shepherd who survives a brutal upbringing through the power of education. It's a movie about redemption through the written and spoken word. It's as stylistically audacious as anything Scorsese ever made. It's bawdy, beautifully acted, terrifying and whimsical. There's nothing quite like it, except maybe the Taviani Brothers' other movies (The Meadow, Kaos, Good Morning, Babylon). It's one of my favorites.

Rating:
Summary: MY FATHER , MY MASTER...
Review: Maltin has clearly just not understood the first thing about this, and should stick to Hollywood blockbusters. This is a fantastic movie about the power that a father holds over his son due to his limiting the son's education and ability to communicate. The fact that Gavino Ledda went on to become a linguist shows the effect that his father had, as well as his determination to overcome the limitations set upon him. And when you're done seeing this, track down any other Taviani film you can, especially Notte di San Lorenzo, perhaps movie made about fascism.

Rating:
Summary: A great, great film
Review: Maltin has clearly just not understood the first thing about this, and should stick to Hollywood blockbusters. This is a fantastic movie about the power that a father holds over his son due to his limiting the son's education and ability to communicate. The fact that Gavino Ledda went on to become a linguist shows the effect that his father had, as well as his determination to overcome the limitations set upon him. And when you're done seeing this, track down any other Taviani film you can, especially Notte di San Lorenzo, perhaps movie made about fascism.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best films ever made!
Review: This film is definitely a beautiful film. The courage that it takes Gavino Ledda to go against his father, his master (padre padrone) is incredible. Although I do not want to sound cliche', it's quite a moving film especially for someone who has endured serious difficulties and what might be setbacks in life. Obviously if you're looking for this movie it's because you've seen it or heard good things about it, but it's a must have. Also note that it is NANNI MORETTI who plays Ledda's friend in the Army in Pisa... I give this movie more than 5 stars.

Rating:
Summary: Ah, The Pity of It...
Review: This is a film that haunts me (especially the first part) so much that for years I couldn't bring myself to write a review on. And yet the look of the small boy in the sleeve brings back so much vivid memories: the same sort of impact of the War Photo showing a shocked, naked small Asian girl (aged 5 or 6?) on the run, crying, taking flee on her own from a bomb upon Japanese invasion... It doesn't have to show you the actual act of violence or brutality. His helplessness in the vastness of the desolate mountainous slopes is just omnipotent and I still can't bring myself to go back to it. It is almost as shocking as a Georgian film from Russia in B/W that I had seen decades ago. One star taken off for its bitter sadness, for it weighs so heavy in your heart...

Rating:
Summary: When the respect becomes horror !
Review: This is a sad and haunting story which focuses in the iliterate Sardinian boy who is brutalized by his father .
Nevertheless this boy will make the grade and become a master Greek and Latin .
If you look back your memory about the disturbing and distorted relationship father and son , there have been just a few who are really winner .
In the thirties , Maedchen in uniform maintains a surprise for you in this girl school with authority and lesbianism . In the forties there is an emblematic issue of Roberto Roselini: Germany anno zero and the boy with the green hair (Joseph Losey) .In the fifties , Pather Panchalli , Jeux interdits (Rene Clement), Rebel without a cause and Giant . In the sixties the sweet bird of youth and the young Torless (Scholondorff) ; in the seventies the Chinese roulette (Fassbinder), Cria cuervos (Saura) .
But it is really during the eighties when this theme will rise in importance . In the nineties the unbeatable Character , Sleepers and Celebration .
This film won The Cannes Festival and that is not just a cumpliment.
The Tavianni brothers developed a realist and pàinful portrait revealing without scruples all the fear and way of living in a peasant family .
The hard times and the fact of living under a same roof but without being a home .
The school works out as a merciless institution where the power is dressed of education ; and the hidden and perverse instincts grow up and will transform in real nightmares for the not so gifted children .
The Tavianni brothers have given new stories and revitalized the italian neo realism . His fundamental filmography include besides, the night of the shooting stars and Caos (my special favorites ) , Good morning Babylon and the Sun even night (Il sole anche di notte)
Watch that jewel film . A triumph of the italian cinema .