L'amico di famiglia

In a word, weird form the outset. From the opening creepy noises and extreme visual stimulation to the random cuts and bizarre set pieces 'The Family Friend' is nothing if not captivating. Its directed superbly by Paolo Sorrentino, whose last film the 'The Consequences of Love' should give you some idea of his visual style and flair, add to this the great cinematography, brilliant use of music and the twisted central performance of Giacomo Rizzo as Geremia and you have a truly excellent if not a little disturbing movie which is part Lynch, Part Fellini and all original. Geremia is a seventy year old tailor which is actually a cover for the fact he is a loan shark. Lonely and sleazy he prays on the needy and during the loan deals poses as a family friend to surround himself with people. One such family borrows money for their daughters wedding and Geremia becomes self appointed helper and starts arranging things for the young couple. Eventually he falls for the bride to be, a winner of the local beauty pageant, and the film becomes a kind of beauty and the beast tale. She is the gorgeous young girl overly fond of dancing and he amongst other things is a seedy, beastly rapist. The films characters are pretty much all unredeemable and it comes across like an Italian 'League of Gentlemen' with its dark humour and strange set ups. The music adds to the weirdness by ranging from Anthony and the Johnsons to classical and country and western. Just like 'Hidden' from last year the film leaves loads of unanswered questions and loose ends but that adds to its deconstructed nature and doesn't detract in anyway from the main story. Its in the smaller things that this film shines like when everyone takes their own chairs to the beauty contest as 'the sponsor and provider of seats pulled out at the last minute' or how Geremia's carrier bag swings from side to side over his plastered arm as he waddles along in schoolboy short trousers. This film won't be to everyone's liking, it is almost certainly an acquired taste, but those that can get under its skin won't be disappointed and will love it for all its creepy eccentricities

This film is not the great piece of cinema many critics/ viewers seem to think it is or want it to be. It has the occasional effective moment/ sequence, and the use of sub-bass was quite original and evocative in the sound mix. However, it's essentially trying to be an art-house film with enough mainstream/generic or light-hearted moments to appeal to your average non-art-house-watching, can't-handle-it-too-grim-or-arty cinema goer. Therefore, it's hugely flawed. It's not really that dark, for instance, despite a bit of dark posturing, and the more likable/ morally "okay" characters win out in the film's irritatingly moral conclusion. The bonding between the bingo-playing old bat and the cowboy sidekick was almost sickening, and was completely unnecessary if the film wanted to maintain a vaguely black/amoral tone (which it did initially appear to be striving for). I personally find the Coen brother's work to combine humour and a an enjoyably surreal darkness far more effectively, and to maintain a more amoral tone. It does not bare comparison to Fellini at all, for one thing there's none of that crazy visual bravura in the mis-en-scene here, and most of time and there's a deeply middle-brow quality to narrative proceedings. Unlike the great Italian films of 60s/ 70s (Visconti, Antonioni etc) the film is quite uninterestingly shot most of the time, with an overuse of extreme close-ups and close-ups, and with a very standard sense of pace in the editing. To be honest, even Dario Argento is far more visually exciting.

The inclusion of the thriller plot towards the end of film simply does not work that well, and feels contrived and somewhat unengaging: the film suddenly decides it no longer wishes to be a slightly arty character-study of a despicable old money lender and tries to be David Mamet to get the audience "on the edge of their seats" - it had the opposite effect for me ultimately. The supporting characters are rubbish - the cowboy friend is like something out of a bad "quirky" short film and the super model girl has no *beep* personality at all... The old woman who's addicted to bingo? God, it's almost Father Ted territory and without the madcap humour or silliness to make such stereotypes genuinely funny.

Some of the music was quite well-used however, and it is still better than another moving/ funny film about the Holocaust or films about small boys and their relationships with wise old men who work in cinemas.

Sorrentino never hides his true fatherhood from which he inspired his films. Fellini. In this film, the main character Geremia states that he starred in two of the films of the great Italian director. In "The Family Friend" you can already guess Sorrentino's future masterpieces. Films touched by a well-balanced dose of surrealism, very well-studied baroque scenography, but especially the drama of the characters, which does not lack the permanent note of vague Mediterranean humor. Even Geremia, a hateful character, has some glimpses of humanity and manages to become acceptable in some scenes. A very good movie, very well played, which does not lack the thriller. A film about pathological greed, ugliness, lack of empathy but especially the inability to understand love.

Amateurish and useless. Could not get to the end.

We forgive Sorrentino since he directed "il divo" Nothing else to add to even to get to the 150 catacthers.

Didn't manage to make it to the end of the film and was left with a feeling of disgust. There is no real plot line, it is essentially just a sequence of scenes picturing this squalid man behaving inappropriately towards different women. Additionally this is pieced together in a try-hard way to try making the film artsy which the film does not accomplish.