Ich habe keine Angst

Perceptible drama filmed with sensitivity and good feeling . Sensational film that dispenses a brooding plot and considered to be one of the best Italian films of the 2000s , in fact was voted one of the best pictures by professionals and critics . Well directed film by Gabriele Salvatores , including a stirring story and screenplay by Niccolò Ammaniti , who tried to create an agreeable flick plenty of sensitivity and metaphor by tackling a description about a bright ten-year-old boy who finds several surprises on his early life . In southern Italy, Michele , a fine little boy , along with his friends visit an old rotten house on the outskirts of their small Italian village . Michelle (Giuseppe Cristiano , director Salvatores interviewed nearly 600 boys for the part , ultimately settling for novice Giuseppe, the son of a Fiat car worker) nearly meets another boy chained in a basement hidden outside his village, but fears to speak of it . Putting together what he learns from television, he starts dealing with the blind boy, his own parents , and a series of unexplained visiting strangers such as Sergio (Diego Abatantuono) , with a high-profile kidnapping that has the entire nation on edge . As Michelle lives with a dysfunctional as well as impoverished family formed by his intimate mother Anna (Aitana Sánchez Gijon) , father Pino (Dino Abbrescia) and brother . Michelle hearing behind doors and he aware horrible happenings . He is so interested in these mysteries that exacerbate his ingenuity and imagination . As Michelle begins to investigate all the secrets of people visit his home , of his family and their stories , but he finds out a terrible conclusion . Who can you trust when everyone's a suspect ?

It's a brilliant and touching story although sometimes is slow moving and tiring but is developed with intelligence and sensibility . In the picture are treated ethics and morals themes narrated with great sense of fairness and ductility . This is an intense as well as sensitive drama dealing with a little boy who meets another filthy, incoherent kid locked into a cellar , where is kept prisoner . A coming-of-age tale in which he discovers the sense of life about dark family secrets, friendship and compassion . This slow-moving and intelligent picture is well set in Southern Italy of the 70s . This film was loosely based on a true story of a kidnapped boy from Milan and the novella written about the incident . Enjoyable and thought-provoking picture starred by a phenomenal little actor , Giuseppe Cristiano . Sensitive film full of feeling , haunting mood-pieces , wonderful scenes and sense of wonder . Colorful picture , including marvelous frames , being mostly filmed at Southern Italy and including sunny outdoor scenes . This extraordinary flick spells through intricate patterns of images , sets , sound and color . His style is pretty much dry in the atmosphere as in the fresh dialog , as well as realistic , and including pleasant elements as when the little boy runs on the cereal countryside ."I'm Not Scared" is one of Tornatore's undisputed masterpieces and fundamental in his filmography where shows efficiently an interesting story and shot at the height of his creativity , with some peculiar characters , as the main starring boy , his lovely mummy magnificently performed by the Spanish Aitana Sánchez Gijon and the grudge visitor well played by Diego Abatantuono . Splendid , luxurious photography with juicy atmosphere is reflected on the marvelous outdoors in the country by cameraman Italo Petriccione , Salvatores's usual , being shot on location in Apulia, and Basilicata, Italy . As the film is mainly told from a child's point of view, director Gabriele Salvatores instructed his director of photography Italo Petriccione to shoot most of the film at a child's height.

This is a Italian/Spanish co-production perfectly financed by magnificent producers as Spanish Miguel Menéndez de Zubillaga of ¨Piedras¨ , ¨Amnesia¨, ¨Utopia¨ , ¨Camaron¨ as Italian ones such as Maurizio Totti , Stabilini and Riccardo Tozzi . The motion picture was stunningly realized by Gabrielle Salvatores . He was born in 1950, Naples, Campania, location where he often shoots his films . He is a very good Italian movies director ; Tornatore is a well recognized filmmaker both nationally and internationally, and in proof of it he won many prizes in several Festivals . The constant theme of his movies is the escape from the problems of the modern world and the most of his movies include philosophical themes . Almost always casts Diego Abatantuono ; frequently also casts Sergio Rubini . Longtime companion of Rita Rabassini , she's the former wife of Diego Abatantuono, who acted in many of Gabriele's movies and is a close friend . Among his most important films are ¨Nirvana¨ , ¨Amnesia¨ , ¨Educazione ¨Siberiana¨, ¨Marrakech Express¨ ,¨ Quo Vadis baby ¨ , his successful and Oscarized ¨Mediterraneo¨ and of course this ¨I'm not scared¨ . Rating : Better than average . Worthwhile watching .

"I'm Not Scared (Io non ho paura)" has a lot in common with the recent Russian film "The Return (Vozvrashcheniye)."

Both start off with poor pre-teen boys' bullying games that then intersect with their returning fathers' parallel adult realities. The contrasting conclusions reflect different national temperaments and the possible political messages in the films.

A major difference is the look that surrounds the contrasts between childhood innocence and male brutishness (abetted by cowed female complicity), where the Russian film is practically in a frigid black and white, the Italian film has the lush, sentimental cinematography of Italo Petriccione, who also worked with director Gabriele Salvatores on the dreamily beautiful "Mediterraneo."

The suspenseful thriller aspects roped me in, though the tension was undercut a bit by the Lavender Hill Mob antics of the conspirators, but the bumbling added to an uneasy feeling of unpredictability, aided by the suspenseful music by Ezio Bosso and Pepo Scherman.

We literally see the happenings through the eyes of the children, which is helped enormously by the unusually expressive and naturalistic child actors Giuseppe Cristiano and Mattia Di Pierro.

Having seen the trailer for the film, I was intrigued. If one doesn't catch an Italian film cycle, it's almost impossible to see a film from that country lately, even in a cosmopolitan city like New York. This film has just been released for a commercial run. Having seen "Mediterraneo" from the same director, Gabriele Salvatores, was another reason for taking a look at this movie.

The film depicts the horrors that Italy lived in the 70s with a wave of kidnappings. While a lot had political undertones, the fact remains that a lot of children were kidnapped for a ransom.

The idyllic way the film unfolds, with the children running freely in the wheat fields, is a sharp contrast of the mystery that is hidden, in a hole, by the abandoned house where they go to play. Michele, the boy at the center of the story, discovers the dark secret that will involve his own family and will end in a tragedy.

This is a story about friendship, loyalty and the realization of the ugliness behind what appears a serene, if poor, family life. Giuseppe Cristiano plays the young boy with conviction and makes us believe he is that boy presented in the story. It also speaks volumes how children interplay with others of their same age no matter whether they are rich, or poor.

The director is to be congratulated for dealing with the subject matter and making us care about a little boy that had the courage to save a life. We'll be looking forward other films from Mr. Salvatores, very soon.

I don't know what it is about Italian directors, but it just seems that they are more interested in making classic movies than their American counterparts. They don't rely on body counts, car crashes and pyrotechnics. Instead they tell stories and use beautiful images and scenery to enhance it. In "Io non ho paura" we are treated to a coming of age fable that indeed makes one feel young again. We see the world through a ten year old's eyes and sadly, we see how reality starts to over take the innocence of youth. Michele lives in an economically depressed part of Southern Italy. He has a father that is often absent and surroundings that come straight out of Dickens. However, even with very little, he manages to entertain himself and little sister. One day while retrieving something for his little sister, he makes an odd discovery, a child, living in a hole, far away from anywhere. He soon comes to see that this child is being held captive. Of course, being a ten year old, Michele has many wild ideas about why the child is in the hole. However, as the film progresses, Michele starts to grow up and realize what a harsh world it can be. What really makes this movie are the beautiful shots of Southern Italy, where golden fields go as far as the eye can see. And although the film's ending is a slight letdown, overall it is still a wonderful film. Here is hoping that some American directors might find their souls and start trying to emulate this type of cinema. Bravo!

[See IMDb main page for this movie for cast credits-none are known outside Italy]

"I'm Not Spoiled" has enjoyed enormous European success and is being screened at art cinemas in the U.S. Shot in a bleak and desolate part of Italy where tourists are never expected, this story of a family thirty or so years ago is seductively engrossing. All is not what it seems. There is both mystery and madness.

Michele, a young boy about ten or so years old, plays with his sister and a small group of friends in empty fields and among ruins of once well-maintained farm houses, now mute ruins. There is no town as such and the only store seems to have few goods or customers.

Michele's father returns from somewhere and he's both loving and hectoring, bestowing presents and admonitions and allowing the two little kids to beat him in arm wrestling. He appears to be a fairly typical Italian paterfamilias, a nice guy. Mom is likable too.

Exploring a vacant, decrepit house Michele discovers a chained and brutalized boy his own age. Confined to a hole in the ground and blinded by any sunlight, the child is clearly a victim of some awful crime. Michele provides sustenance for the kid but makes no effort to alert anyone to the boy's predicament. And that's fortunate because the balance of the film deals with Michele's growing understanding of why and how this angelic-appearing child in white has been kidnapped and chained in a dank hole.

Michele makes a slow journey to a reluctant and frightened maturity as he begins to understand what is going on. As with so many children, he recognizes that grownups upon whom he depends may be more than they seem to be and much of what they are isn't very nice.

The acting, especially by the two young boys and Michele's sister, is convincingly real, free of affect. Much of the cinematography emphasizes the loneliness of a bypassed-by-prosperity region but the director, unfortunately, succumbed to some mannerized filming. Closeups of small field creatures are shots which add nothing to the story and inject a contrived artificiality.

Not many films successfully center a mysterious and terrifying predicament as a way of exploring children's emotional lives. "I'm Not Scared" does.

8/10