The new sentimental film from director Ferzan Özpetek starts out and ends up quite strong. But so much of the middle is a mushy, melodramatic mess that feels more soap opera than art house. Nuovo Olimpo is as gorgeous to watch as its central characters (until their horrible "old person" make up later in the film) but its penchant for Hallmarky coincidence and its clumsy handling of love saps much of the good will it earns in its take off and landing.
The opening sequence is a beautiful reconstruction of pre queer liberation connection. Our heroes meet at a cinema (no not that kind) where gay men frequent to meet each other for hook ups in the bathroom. They are all young and beautiful like the modern fantasy of this time and our protagonists are even more so because they don't hook up and instead feel an immediate connection that is too "good" for public sex. One is more closet than the other so they make plans, find a space they can truly be, have beautifully filmed sex, and make plans for a reunion but their plans go awry when they are separated by the chaos of a local demonstration and police action. It is the 70s so they have no way to find each other again.
It was at this moment when I knew the film was going off the rails. The slow motion and dramatic music felt syrupy and more over the top than the film had been to this point. We then follow our characters separately as they jump through time to the near present, one becoming a surgeon and the other a successful film maker who even makes a film about their encounter. The doctor even sees the film with his wife and friends. It would have been so easy for these two to reconnect but they just don't despite the film's central premise that they each never got over the other. No one takes steps to find the other despite how easy it would have been at multiple points in story. At this point the whole thing just feels silly.
But it's the third act that feels like low grade soap opera. The film maker is injured and the doctor is the one to operate on. The film draws this out because it's the film maker's eyes which are injured so he spends a long time with bandages around him face preventing him from seeing. They interact over and over to the point where the audiences eyes are rolling so far back in our heads that we need eye surgery.
But...
when the film does it's final dramatic reveal and the two are finally reunited suddenly Nuovo Olimpo finds its backbone. It doesn't give them the long awaited reunion one is expecting. The parties are able to acknowledge to each other, the importance the remembrance of the other was in their lives, and then go on their way. It was a very restrained scene for a film that was so indulgent throughout.
The the final moment is quite nice as well. The camera pans to a restaurant and we are back in the 70s, we see them as if they had not been separated but had had the chance to follow through with their plans. We see a world where their connection was not taken from them. The possibilities remain ahead of them along a different path.
But the film overall is just too silly. It eschews any development of the political backdrop which kept them apart and leans into crazy koinkydink and schmaltzy moments like when the film maker runs into the woman who ran the theatre which gives her a chance to wax poetic on loving queer men and the sacrifices that entailed.
I think there was a better film to be made here about how brief connections can impact us and contribute so much to who we are, about how different our paths may have been if small moments had played out differently, and about how cultures are designed to keep queer people from having real connection. But Nuovo Olimpo is just too silly a film to achieve any of that.
Nuovo Olimpo
Starring: Damiano Gavino, Andrea Di Luigi
Director: Ferzan Özpetek
Writers: Gianni Romoli, Ferzan Özpetek
No comments:
Post a Comment