Tommaso

Viewed June 5, 2020. Trying to find order in a world driven by impulse. This one is probably only for the diehards, but the combination of Ferrara's raw self-introspection and his compassionate sense of life's great small pleasures make this a haunting work.

Typically episodic Ferrara seems like a genuine attempt to grapple with masculinity while avoiding modern woke cliches. This is unfashionable film making to its core, and it's admirable from that standpoint. Dafoe grounds the material, providing a focus that it would otherwise lack, and it's tonally coherent (especially for late Ferrara), but the parallels to the director's own life smack of self-indulgence, and Tommaso's psychodramas are not complex or interesting enough to sustain it.

Willem Defoe was a great choice because he looks like the recovering drug addict he is portraying. His wife looks too much like a super model. For me it was uninteresting and tiresome. I really disliked so much spoken Italian and all of the rehab group scenes. This movie is like following a loser around with a camera. The ending really sucked. I really can't recommend it. Perhaps it might be more enjoyable if you speak Italian, or are a recovering addict.

It has its uneven philosophical ramblings - like Siberia -, but shows once again how Ferrara manages to completely break down his classic MELTDOWN material into self-reflexive -- post-Blackout addiction, the crazy process behind Siberia -- cinematherapy about domestic life, artistic urges, impulsive desire and the everyday struggle to deal with sobriety and demons from the past. All of this with Dafoe's magnetic presence - Last Temptation style - and Ferrara's delicate yet relentless camerawork.