The Place

This movie is simply perfect, thanks to the 2 geniuses who cooperated: the writer, Christopher Kubasik, and the director, Paolo Genovese. The story of Kubasik is absolutely original, and I think Genovese did a fantastic job as a director. The actors are awsome, the pace, the dialogs, the editing, the atmosphere are flawless. This is a must see.

I kind of enjoyed The Place even though it has lots of flaws. The acting and dialogue was spot on and the story had enough twists to keep me interested until the end. The film did however have lots of problems for me. First of all the editing and cinematophy were really dull and I had a very hard time finding a motivation behind certain choices that were made. The soundtrack also didnt work for me at all. The music was very uninteresting and generic, it would probably have worked better with no music at all, or at least with some restraint. The horrible music at the end left me running away from the theatre.

In conclusion: director Paulo Genovese is good at directing his actors and keeping a story interesting like in his previous film Perfect Strangers, but the style of the film was very poor and undermined the potential of the story greatly.

How far will you go to get the things you desire? Is there any limit at all?

Another creative writing from Paolo Genovese, the director of Perfect Strangers (Post #38 on Zoetrope360, Instagram). This movie is thought provoking as it explores the dark side of us, what are we willing to do to get the things we want.

The entire movie happens within a cafe, The Place. It's like reading a book, you visualize the things happening outside based on what people interact in the cafe.

The Place is a vivid example of why European cinema will always be relevant. A simple tie is maximum, all the actions of the film take place in one place. Ordinary actors (perhaps in Italy they are known, but I only know Marco Giallini). And dialogues. The whole film rests on them. They are as simple as possible - everything is shot in a regular eight. Nice simple chamber story.

The film keeps you engaged from the start, and leaves plenty to think about when it's over. And yet it is neither preachy nor pretentious. It starts off as a film about the things people would be prepared to do in order to achieve their dreams, but it moves on to other themes, such as what you think you need vs. what you really need, being able to live with oneself having achieved something through trickery and evil deeds, or good outcomes eventually arising from people's intentions to actually do bad things. The film does not involve action, it is based around dialogue. But rest assured, it will never bore you, and it will keep introducing twists that will keep you engaged and constantly guessing what will happen next.