"Mother, why am I so unhappy?" This asks Bruno (Valerio Mastandrea and Giacomo Bibbiani) to his terminal mother while he dances with her. His mother, Anna (played by Stefania Sandrelli and Micaela Ramazotti) replies: "Oh Bruno, you've always been a grouch!"
These two sentences were not able to summarize better the film. Some people are naturally pessimistic set and Bruno is one of those people. When his mother in 1971, winning a local Miss Summer Mamma election, he can do nothing but watch cranky. And he has every reason: his mother put him and his family a fool, and his father Mario (Sergio Albelli) can not handle the attention goes out to his radiant wife. From that moment the daily fuss in the family Michelucci. Mario is the corrective tap long gone and so Anna packed on a rainy night her children and belongings together and flees to a precarious existence with many different moves and lovers. The naive Anna takes different lengths and can be taken in by Berlusconi-like types so it comes down to is that Bruno often have to take care of his younger sister Valeria. His youth has signed him forever, around forty Bruno still far too serious egoist who are self-pity thronging with different types of drugs. If it turns out that his mother is ill, he will still have to return to his hometown to make that inevitable plunge into the past.
Not far Search
In Italy director Paolo Virzi world famous. For the Italian equivalent of the Oscars, the David di Donatello awards he was nominated several times with different films and he captured the two of them. In 2008 he directed the film Tutta la vita Devanti which Micaela Ramazotti also had a role, along with his then wife Paoloa Tiziana Cruciano. She played in the film the mother of the character of Michaela Ramazotti. Apparently realized Virzi while filming his wife indeed what was maturing, and after filming, he left his wife for fifteen years younger Micaela. This was entirely disadvantageous exchange not, Micaela is a beautiful and talented actress and he did for the completion of the main La Prima Cosa Bella also not far to seek. Which Virzi not have to search far was his primary location. La Prima Cosa Bella plays in the Italian coastal town of Livorno in Tuscany. If we are to believe the movie, it is a hamlet which is much gossip. Virzi herself grew up in Livorno and fled the place as soon as he could. Although nowhere is mentioned that the film is autobiographical, the story bears some resemblance to Virzi's own life. Thus, the father in the film sergeant and mother actress. Virzi's own father is a policeman and his mother a singer. It is quite possible that Virzi in his film script a lot of experiences from his own childhood has processed.
Passionate renditions
Italians have family high on its agenda as reflected in many films, including La Meglio Gioventu, My Brother Is an Only Child, La Di Lardi Biciclette and fairly recently Io Sono L'Amore. The bond between father and son, brother and sister, and mother and son in this film is a regular central and is the epicenter of the plot. La Prima Cosa Bella is a real actor movies where the plot is secondary to the characters. The actors give their characters stature as only Italians that could, with gestures, intonations and openness of emotions; all the actors give themselves into a passionate rendition. We also see clearly the traditional change of the protagonist back: at the beginning of the movie Bruno is a very unpleasant and unfeeling man, at the end he seems like a totally different person. The return to his birthplace and the reunion with his family removed him from his downward spiral. He understands that accepting the unconditional love between family members is the first step towards the happiness he seeks for years.
La Prima Cosa Bella is composed of two parts: the childhood of Bruno ranging from 1970 to about 1980, and the present in which Anna is dying. At the start, the youth much more fun to watch the colorful sets and the unpredictability of mother Anna. Obliges the viewer is brought back every now and then to 2009, the ever sulking Bruno, not even his best to show interest in his family to behold. Fortunately, the scenes that childhood concern much longer, and before you know it, you find yourself standing in the present in which all loose ends at the deathbed of Anna come together.
No high trotter
La Prima Cosa Bella focuses primarily on the people in the film. It has clearly not been Virzi's intention to deliver a marvelous film. In terms of camera images and editing the film is absolutely no high trotter. Virzi must have thought that just the beautiful appearance of his wife's lack of visual creativity can hide. In addition, the plot is not exciting or original enough to take example of the level Best of Youth. The originality is mainly expressed by the two-part narrative of the story, so there is still some tension or curiosity is built up in the viewer.
Conclusion
La Prima Cosa Bella is a traditional Italian family story that is worn especially by the actors perform their roles with the usual Italian passion. The theme of the film is to be sought in the interest of maintaining family ties and love that it brings. The film keeps switching from the present to the past and back again. This narrative style provides the necessary curiosity and excitement that the movie now and then could use. Because the film visually shows little news, it will not join the major titles in the Italian cinema. Yet La Prima Cosa Bella has become a good standard Italian family visit.
