FILM & VIDEO

Home > FILM & VIDEO > My Mother's Smile & La Strada, Martino's Summer & 20 Cigarettes

• Tweet
• Outlook
• ICAL
• PRINT
• Email
• Feedback

• RSS

• Official Website
• Buy Tickets
• Add to My Favorites

My Mother's Smile & La Strada, Martino's Summer & 20 Cigarettes

Presented by Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival at Cinema Paradiso

June 4, 2011

Add Review/Comment

My Mother’s Smile: The Vatican apparently hated this drama, which is understandable since it portrays Catholics in Rome as hypocritical opportunists who consider "carpe diem" a mandate to justify borderline behavior. Director Marco Bellocchio doesn't sensationalize scandal or high-level misconduct -- he merely looks at one family's doings, and the church's role in making that family's matriarch a saint.

Does the mother deserve canonization? Absolutely not claims the central character, a steadfast atheist named Ernesto (Sergio Castellitto of "Mostly Martha") who says she verbally abused her offspring, including him, with her constant warnings about blasphemy. "She was stupid," Ernesto tells a cardinal conducting the Vatican's hearing. "You don't ask a child, 'What's wrong with you?' (and) 'Don't do this. Don't do that!' Not if there's no conviction behind your words."

Ernesto should know since he's now the father of a young son. The boy lives with Ernesto's ex-partner, who gets him taking a religion class. More ominously for Ernesto, the ex has -- for three years, behind his back -- conspired with Ernesto's siblings and aunts to tell church leaders that the mother was a saintly figure. Their motives are dubious, with some of them admitting they're interested only in the prestige of official Vatican recognition. A professionally successful painter, Ernesto wants none of it -- or at least that's what he believes as he meets a succession of Italians who have their own staunch ideas on the role of the Church. 1:30

La Strada: Gelsomina is sold by her very poor mother to Zampanò, an itinerant strongman. She follows him on the road ("la strada") and helps him during his shows. Zampanò ill-treats her. She meets "The Fool", a funambulist. She feels like going with him, but he puts confusion in her mind by pointing out that perhaps Zampanò is in fact in love with her ...4 pm

The summer of 1980 was a tragic summer of bloodshed, marked by the shooting down of the DC9 plane in the skies over Ustica in june and the terrorist bombing in Bologna’s train station on the 2nd of August: two tragic episodes that are the backstage of the story of Martino, an Italian boy, and Clark, an American captain. A relationship that began and developed by teaching how to surf, and taught each one of them how to tackle their ghosts. 6 pm