awkwardmongoose Review of Human Capital

Human Capital (2013)

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue

[6/10 · 12 January 2014]

When it comes to go to the cinema I am always hesitant, I prefer to go on my own and I am OCD about the location, the seat and the quality of the projection. Anyway there still is a bunch of directors who is able to drag me to an actual cinema and Paolo Virzì will always be a member of this inner circle. The Human Capital based on an American book and transposed into a chilly Lombardy. Two families the first bourgeois and the latter loaded raiding the present economy are linked by their teenager children and by a terrible accident that could change their life. The film is split in four chapter (three named after the lead character and the fourth which is recapitulatory and conclusive), and this narrative technique is old and overindulged, but I understand the choice made in order to play up the thriller side of the film. As for the "something new", I loved this new setting, Virzì for his first time has gone north exploring the phony world of private school, party and high finance, avoiding triteness with his choice to shoot in Brianza. An honourable mention goes to the cast and especially to Gifuni, Bentivoglio and Bruni Tedeschi. Here we come to "Something borrowed", without being pedantic Virzì draws fully from the experience of Elio Petri(Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion), Luchino Visconti(Conversation Piece, The Damned) and Tonino Cervi(Portrait of a Bourgeois in Black) without forgetting his origins as a comedy writer interested mostly by the south side of Italy ( Ferie d'Agosto, Ovosodo etc...). And finally "something blue", looking back to Virzì's previous production the depression has always been a main theme. In the Human Capital Valeria Bruni Tedeschi is clearly clinically depressed, she lives in a golden cage, killing her time in futile occupation to fulfill her substantial lack of joy, with her big blue eyes and her hoarse voice Bruni Tedeschi really nailed her role, and spiced up a film which wasn't able to totally get me but I still cannot define a bad film.