La città proibita

Gabriele Mainetti returns with another, genre-bending film. While his storytelling is too indulgent regarding runtime, there's no denying the sheer energy and inventiveness he brings to the screen. This time, he plunges us into a vivid, chaotic, and deeply human story that fuses action, humor, and social commentary.

Enrico Borello ( The Invisible Thread, Settembre, Familia, Supersex) delivers his most mature performance yet, shedding the supporting roles of his early career to fully embrace a lead character as rugged as he is endearing. His portrayal of a Roman cook navigating a whirlwind of conflicts-both personal and external-anchors the film with a raw, unpretentious charm. Watching him embody this role with such ease and charisma suggests he's ready for even bigger challenges ahead.

A standout element is Yaxi Liu, who doesn't just bring physical prowess to the screen with her martial arts skills but also a compelling emotional presence. Meanwhile, Marco Giallini and Sabrina Ferilli add depth and charisma.

What sets this film apart is Mainetti's ability to merge stylized action with deeply rooted cultural elements. Multicultural Rome, in his hands, becomes more than just a backdrop; it's a living, breathing character, full of contradictions, grit, and poetry. His fearless approach to blending different genres makes for an exhilarating experience .

Sometimes you do not need to come up with a pun or a summary line (though as always no pun intended) ... you just use the self explanatory German title of the movie ... et voila here we go. I like the director and the movie begins quite ... well if you are into action, this will be quite the opening for you.

From the training montage, to the action scene ... after that it will slow down a bit. But you will still get the occasional action bit to enjoy. And you will also get a love story ... well actually more than one love story ... not just between characters ... but also the city and maybe even building/objects ... just saying.

Well acted, the script may be a bit of a small let down ... I'd be surprised if you didn't guess the "big" twist ... but hey, this is entertainment so here we go (and no not everyone was Kung Fu Fighting ... actually many were not - plus Ghost Dog vibes! Same same, but different)

Gabriele Mainetti's fun mixed film bowl (of roman holiday, italian family values, restaurants and kickass martial arts) set in the central but little known ethnic part of town, deserves more success and love than it actually garnered. This was supposed to be the comercial comeback of a maverick filmmaker who exactly 10 years ago smashed the box office with his unlikely super hero "Jeeg Robot", which also launched the career of actor Luca Marinelli ("M"; "Martin Eden"). This time on hand a cast of beloved local stars includes Sabrina Ferilli ("La grande bellezza"), Marco Giallini (best at playing baddies in the Lee Van Cleef mood) paired with likable newcomer Enrico Borello and to die for stuntwoman turned actress Yaxi Liu (plus new handsome italo-chinese thesps), on a revenge blitz to the Eternal City. And that is what all the well penned characters in the film bargain for: danger, death, spectacular martial fights (that give Jason Statham or even Jackie Chan a run for their money) and true love...So I loved and recommend this fast and furious take on my hometown bathed in asian scent rarely seen since my childhood hero Bruce Lee's shoot in Rome in 1972 ("The Way of the Dragon").

The main story is truly boring if it were not for the girl who fights very well and for the action scenes there would really be nothing interesting, and in my opinion the film had to continue on that line, that is, the line of revenge until the end but instead it offers us unnecessary dialogues and completely redundant situations that is that they are still repeated and again, the story is really too trivial to be able to fill 2 hours and 18 minutes of film, as if it were not enough, Guilty, then in addition to all many clichés there is also an improbable love story with the Vespa but not in Ostia Mare, the love story is truly inherent and cannot create any kind of interest and emotion because there is no minimum of chemistry between the two and the script does not even try to create this chemistry TAR The two protagonists are sincerely disappointed by this script, love of love 4, Thriller 5, fights 8, final vote 3.5.

Stunning cinematography, outstanding performances, and a genuinely intriguing premise. The screenplay, however... The first half hour is powerful, tight, and wouldn't be out of place in a film by Miike or Tarantino. At the outset, the blend of Eastern action cinema and Italian-style comedy seems to work miraculously well. The two genres manage to coexist because each character is sketched just enough to give the film its necessary weight.

Then suddenly, right after the Chinese woman asks Marcello to set her free, the film collapses-spectacularly. The two of them go for a stroll around Rome and, out of the blue, she transforms from The Bride in Kill Bill into Alice in Wonderland. From that point on, her personality begins to swing wildly: one moment she's a wild tigress, the next she's Audrey Hepburn perched on the back of a Vespa, and then suddenly she's a picture-perfect housewife from a breakfast cereal advert.

The film never quite recovers its thread. It spirals into needless psychologising and tearful lamentations. There are also some musical Morettisms that feel entirely redundant. It all wraps up like a vaguely Italian noir, with a final scene that feels clumsily tacked on.

Gabriel Mainetti is an extraordinarily gifted filmmaker-but he'd do well to follow a coherent narrative line rather than raiding his cinephile's memory bank and stitching together mismatched bits of other people's films.