After Midnight (2004) User Reviews

After Midnight

[Dean_Moriarty · 8/10 · 3 June 2005]

This film is a treat for all cinema lovers. This quirky comedy and love story about a modern Buster Keaton-like character takes place in the amazing Mole Museum of Cinematography in Torino, Italy—a place that is now on my list of places to visit. As the narrator informs us, this is story just as much about places as it is people. A sense of nostalgia weaves the film together with elements of classic silent film techniques, quirky slapstick comedy and expressionism.

3 different film formats are used in shooting this film. The combination of 35mm, digital video and 9.5mm make this film a feast for the eyes. Ferrario utilizes the ever-classic iris in and iris out transition effect as a delightful homage to Keaton and other classic filmmakers of the day. He cleverly draws parallels between the characters in the film and characters in the classic films by cross-cutting between clips of Keaton and a German expressionist film (i don't believe i can't remember which one) and the main characters Martino (Giorgio Pasotti) and Amanda (Francessa Inaudi). The unbalanced lines in the mise- en-scene give a sort of throw back to expressionism, which works well in representing the character of Amanda.

Ferrario makes many different allusions that are fun to connect, such as Fitzgerald's "eyes of TJ Eckelburg, Fibonacci's numbers, and of course the works of Buster Keaton. In and out this film is just a joy to watch. Stylistic, yet simple, and if nothing else charming.

Reel Or Imaginary

[writers_reign · 8/10 · 10 December 2005]

This is yet another valentine to movies and the part they play in people's lives, at once referential and innovative. It does however require a certain suspension of disbelief - is it, for example, feasible that a caretaker would (a) be allowed to live in the museum full time and (b) have access to all the expensive equipment housed there so that he can, in effect, run movies to his heart's content. Once we get round that we can relax and enjoy what is in effect a gentle, tender romance in which people get beaten up; it's contraries like this that make it interesting. Essentially it's a film about losers, four to be exact: A girl who works in a fast-food outlet with only vague dreams of improving her lot; her boyfriend who steals cars for a living and treats her as an object rather than a partner, yet, perversely doesn't want to lose her but will if the right man comes along; her roommate, a hairdresser, who fancies the car thief herself, and Martino, the caretaker of the museum, who lives in a world of his own and takes as a role model Buster Keaton. Martino loves the girl from afar but when she scalds her boss and the police are called she holes up in the museum and falls into a relationship with Martino. When the heat is off and she can leave she realizes that she loves both men, who ask her to choose between them. This is a quirky entry that definitely grows on you and benefits by featuring virtual unknowns in the lead roles. Well worth checking out and very probably a second look.

Brilliant and slightly clever

[smdusk · 6/10 · 21 April 2004]

The 2004 new movie by one of the most intriguing Italian directors. Despite of a low budget and a not-famous cast (except for the narrating voice), this movie is purely entertaining and involving: fascinating sequences inside the Turin's wonderful Mole, actual venue of the most important Italian cinematographic museum. Not-so-profound characters and dialogs, and sometimes a bit of inaccuracy in playing, but a sincere view in the struggle for love, solitude and boredom. Very nice editing with sequences of early cinema movie clips, especially by Buster Keaton.

The absurd cinema fantasies of a young man take over his reality .

[sodawater52 · 13 June 2005]

This movie is totally charming. It is Italy's answer to "Amelie". The humor and romance keep you smiling and on the edge of your seat. Afterall the nerds finish first here. Lots of very modern backdrops and situations. This is a very fun story with a great ending. The movie is built on a story within a story within a story and is endless in it's interpretation of symbolism and our empathy with the characters live's. The two main characters are the misfits of society and somehow seem to find each other in spite of themselves. The absurd idea of the main character playing out his fantasies in real life from the inspiration of his works efforts are quite imaginative and constantly intriguing. To top it off, the story has a tragedy but the ending stays true for the romantic characters.

Seattle International Film Festival. David Jeffers for Tablet SIFFblog

[rdjeffers · 7/10 · 26 June 2005]

Monday May 23, 9:30pm Neptune Theater, Thursday May 26, 4:30pm The Harvard Exit

"For one person to be happy, another has to cry."

Ironic humor, pathos and a profound respect for tradition are the sentimental foundation for this tale of Martino and his secret love for Amanda, his fast food muse. He is night watchman at the Mole Antonelliana, the unrealized synagogue turned National Museum of Cinema in Turin. Bound to tradition, represented in his Grandfather, but searching for his own identity through the vast archives he is entrusted to protect, Martino lives in a cinema purgatory of his own creation, relating more to his world of gadgets, Buster Keaton and the Lumiere Brothers than living breathing humans. Our perspective is via his first person narrative, at times more naive and youthful than we might expect. She is the wannabe bad girl, submissive girlfriend of hoodlum biker Angel. Amanda is part Fendi model, part Flora from Botticelli's la Primavera, stuck in a greasy red and yellow tile burger hell. When she deep-fries her idiot bosses trousers while he's wearing them, she seeks refuge from the police at the Mole to the surprise and amazement of Martino. This film pays homage to film. The cavernous, sacred setting, almost another character itself, Martino's lofty digs, his awe of Amanda and her peril suggest The Hunchback of Notre Dame. A bicycle ride with his girl on the handlebars is straight out of Butch Cassidy. He revels in the world of slapstick comedy from the silent era and it's overt, swooning, tinted romance. The humorous and almost sad sound of the Banda Tradizionale repeated throughout the picture brings to mind Fellini's Amacord. Martino executes the physical pantomime and one perfect wheeling turn, as Chaplinesque as Johnny Depp's dance of the dinner roles from Benny and Joon. In the end, Amanda, torn between Angel, an unfaithful dog, and Martino, an adoring puppy, reflects, and decides, not to decide. The final homage is a blessing, "Two boys and one girl? I saw a French movie once." "Was the ending happy?" "They died." The biggest problem with such an obvious reference is the inevitable comparisons, these three lack the depth and freshness of characters from a legend of the New Wave they seek to imitate. While very sweet and oh so curious, Franchesca Inaudi's Amanda hasn't the fire and soul of Jeanne Moreau's Catherine. Giorgio Pasotti's Martino and Fabio Troiano's Angel are merely dim reflections of those they seek to imitate. But hey, Icarus was having a great time until... Written, produced and directed by journalist filmmaker Davide Ferrario, After Midnight is filled with pleasing and unusual images, the first and last we see, dust, floating in space. An iconic, towering, fifty foot image of Anita Ekberg, la Luna, again and again, as though the darkness of the world at night becomes the darkness of the cinema, Amanda's dream of freedom, running, as she sleeps safely in Martino's bed, the flickering nickelodeon, literally walking and living in the camera obscura, the closing aperture of the lens. Comedy is always there, thieves drowning a car alarm in a bucket of water, the handyman Ivan, dropping from the sky for his morning coffee, Martino using his tiny antique camera to film Amanda's underwear, drying on a clothesline, two-bit gangsters singing karioke, badly, and Martino's constant eating of apples, "I hate the double fry special. I like apples," and Amanda realizes he wasn't there for the burgers, his secret love revealed. "Always leave them wanting more," may always bring them back, but the unrealized also leads to frustration and disappointment. While on the right track, hopefully Ferrario learns and improves in subsequent films. Still, After Midnight is a sweet, endearing story of love, the movies, love and the movies and love of the movies. "Tales are like dust. Movies may end but cinema never."

A smashing ode to film and love; don't miss it!

[roland-104 · 9/10 · 24 November 2005]

This is a wonderfully inventive romantic comedy set primarily within the Mole Antonelliana, a fabulous 19th Century building in Turin that since 2000 has housed the Italian National Museum of Cinema.

The love story is a triangular dilemma in which a young woman loves two men and cannot force herself to choose one over the other. Amanda (Francesca Inaudi in her film debut) is a fast food clerk whose life seems to be heading nowhere. Her boyfriend Angelo (Fabio Troiano) is a car thief and control freak who seems more closely bound to his trio of henchmen than to Amanda. Though handsome and charming in his way, he never stays the night and forgets about their dates.

Then one evening Amanda urgently needs a place to stay and accidentally bumps into Martino (Giorgio Pasotti), a solitary cinephile who works and lives in the Museum, located near the burger joint where she works. He takes her in, and things begin to change for everybody.

Martino hardly talks at all. For him life on the silver screen is reality, so he sees little point in social ties or even leaving the Museum, except for trips to the fast food place when Amanda's on duty. He hates the food but buys it anyway as a pretext to be close to her. He is so unobtrusive that she had never before noticed him, but for Martino, she is the dear if distant object of his total affection. He actually creates a film about the history of Turin, embedded within which are shots of Amanda taken from a distance.

Buster Keaton is Martino's role model for conducting a relationship with a woman. The Keaton formula for success in love necessitates a series of struggles, pratfalls and temporary defeats ending in shy, glancing kisses and handholding. When circumstances dictate that Amanda stay in hiding at the Museum for several days, Martino proceeds to approach her in the Keaton manner. This isn't exactly Amanda's cup of tea. Their cavorting over the ensuing days is one of the more endearingly humorous sequences in recent cinema.

Once Amanda is reunited with Angelo, he senses immediately that something has changed. He cleans up his romantic act, but his reforms come too late to neutralize Amanda's affection for Martino. Inspired by watching Buster Keaton take on a gigantic man to win the favors of the woman he loves, Martino comes to challenge Angelo. Priding himself on being 'principled,' Angelo proposes that, rather than him and his gang beating Martino to a pulp, the two lovers should instead let Amanda choose between them and abide by her decision. But she will not choose, leading to some amusingly awkward dates for the trio.

The story is narrated by a sage fellow (Silvio Orlando, never seen) who treats the viewer almost as a godlike partner, joining him in enjoying the follies of these three earthlings. Actually it's four: I've left out Amanda's roommate, Barbara (Francesca Picozza, also making her film debut here), a beautician with horrid hair and makeup who lusts after Angelo and believes that love is always a zero sum game.

All four principal roles are well acted. Distinctions in personalities of the characters are made vividly clear. Miss Inaudi is captivating. She is poised - confident, relaxed and natural - in her movements and speech, and has ivory skin, warm almond eyes, and a sweet, simple little smile that charms. But for me there's nothing quite as sexy as a broken looking nose on a woman (I think of Kristin Scott Thomas, for example), and Inaudi's marvelous shnozz looks like she took a tough blow sometime long ago, though most likely this feature of her anatomy is genetic.

In fact, the most striking member of the cast is the Museum itself. Built between 1863 and 1889 as a Synagogue, it is one of Europe's largest masonry buildings. The City of Turin has owned the place since before the turn of the last century, and it was entirely remodeled in the late 90s so that the Cinema Museum could be relocated from the Palazzo Chiablese to these more dramatic quarters.

The place has been designed to function something like the Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan, though it's much larger and more grand. The dominant feature of the building is a giant cupola. Now a glass walled elevator takes visitors high up into the cupola, from where they can descend, strolling on an inclined walkway that spirals downward past numerous displays on movie themes. The main floor houses a richly upholstered theater for larger screen presentations.

The love triangle is, of course, too unstable to last, and it doesn't. Things do sort themselves out in the end, in a manner that, in the final scene, poetically entwines the boundaries of reality and cinema in the most visually lovely manner. This film reflects an inspired level of imagination on the part of Davide Ferrario, who wrote as well as directed. Its self-styled connections to great cinema from the past are not for a moment pretentious. This is a respectful homage, and, besides that, it's one terrific movie. (In Italian) My rating: 8.5/10 (A-). (Seen on 04/28/05). If you'd like to read more of my reviews, send me a message for directions to my websites.

Love of cinema and love of Love

[maisannes · 9/10 · 13 February 2005]

After Midnight (9 out of 10)

Give me the Italian love of cinema and love of love over the French any day of the week, well, maybe 6 out of 7.

Here we have a movie about movies shot on digital video with a genre plot and some postmodern reflexivism thrown in. In the hands of a certain French New Wave director whose name I refuse to type, who in fact has used all of these devices himself, these tactics would be used at times to alienate, to smirk, to nudge-nudge-wink-wink, and to create narrative distance or irony. Ferrario uses them for all their worth, but with a consistently joyful embrace of both his characters and his audience. It's as if all 95 minutes of Band of Outsiders were running through the Louvre and dancing the Madison.

Any movie that keeps a smile fixed on my face from start to finish deserves a superior mark, even if it doesn't have the depth or reach of other movies I rank as highly.

The Triumph of Imagination

[robert-temple-1 · 10/10 · 22 February 2008]

This is a spectacular achievement, of a perfectly-judged fable whose every moment and every detail is successful. It was made on a shoestring (they even had to wheel the camera in a supermarket trolley because they could not afford a dolly), but the production values look like and feel like a big-budget movie. The cinematography is deeply intriguing, partially due to the use of a highly light-sensitive digital camera, which is able to film in dark and moody places by natural light. Davide Ferrario, the writer, producer and director, is a unique cinematic artist. It is insufficient to call him brilliant, and even the word 'inspired' seems too tepid to do him justice. I would prefer to call him 'a force', like the wind or the waves. This magical film captures a kind of metaphysical power of the imagination, which transforms reality in front of our eyes. All except one member of the cast were unknowns. The project was a huge risk. But the result is a complete triumph. The casting was perfectly judged, and the performers more than delivered the goods. The only one with experience, Giorgio Pasotti, says little because he plays a silent character, but evokes the character's inner being with total success. Even more astounding is the performance by Francesca Inaudi, and she is more than 'a natural', she is a 'supernatural', whose facial muscles were designed for film-making. Another star of the film is a bizarre and gigantic building in the city of Turin called 'the Mole'. It is one of the most mysterious film sets ever used, and what is more bizarre, it is all real. Nothing about this film is 'normal', thank God, since what is more boring than normality? And yet nothing is abnormal either, it is just that it is all happening in the imagination, which transcends the difference. Two stories intersect, like two intersecting light-cones in space-time, and from the crossing of their beams, brilliant and scintillating interference patterns emerge, and then the individual stories are re-directed and electrons and positrons spray out in different directions. The film is about a collision of two parallel universes. No, three. The third is us.

Real life has to take place in reality,but movies can help!

[herjoch · 9/10 · 13 May 2007]

Very seldom Italian movies find their way on to German screens,so I was delighted to find this little gem,moreover in the original Italian,which gives it a special flavor."In the past films were more about places than about characters"- so tells the narrator near the films beginning.According to that, one of the main constituents is "La Mole" in Turine,at one time the highest building in Europe and now housing the film-museum of Italy.It's a magnificent building with spiral stairways and convoluted corridors and provides an adequate place for a story between reality and the world of cinema.The story is about a love-triangle reminiscent of the french "Nouvelle Vague"-there are parallels to "Jules et Jim" and to"A bout de soufflé" concerning the female lead.It is told in a feathery way and in its love for the old-school poetic film-making reminded me of "The science of sleep".It is a tragicomical reflection about the necessity of storytelling and the immortality of cinema.Almost everyone left the well crowded cinema with a smile on his face.So if you enjoy a poetic,fairytale-like movie take the opportunity and watch it.

A love story and a heartfelt ode to cinema!

[mcongedi · 9/10 · 25 June 2020]

What a find was this film! Set in Torino's Mole Antonelliana (the museum of cinema in that city), this is a picaresque and very charming love story with lots of cinematic references for film aficionados to soak up. The most obvious dedication is to the inimitable Buster Keaton, the main actor (Giorgio Pasotti) is as deadpan and silent as Buster was. But there are also loving references to the film-makers from Torino's silent cinema hey-day, the early 1910s, when Torino lead the world in cinema quality. Scenes from the silent film "Fuoco" by Italy's master silent film director Giovanni Pastrone are used throughout the film.

Silent film techniques are used from time to time in the film in this charming, funny, entertaining and ultimately warm love story that doubles as a tribute to the cinema pioneers of the silent era.

It is a master work from Director/Writer Davide Ferrario and one that deserves accolades.