Gianfranco Rosi
Sacro Gra

THE REVIEW

Yesterday I watched SACRO GRA. My comment? SACRO MAH…

It's definitely an unusual film, peculiar, original, it deserves credit for that. Micro-stories of people living around the GRA. The actors play themselves. Docufilm. There are some interesting/funny moments, but overall, I found it quite a BORING PIECE OF CRAP. The director GIANFRANCO ROSI is a documentarian.

A good part of the critics claim that a couple of his previous documentaries are superior to SACRO GRA.

Let me tell you, oh... boring… at certain moments, the film just got stuck… still shots, silences, people talking and saying things not even that interesting… ok, they are not actors, they are themselves, but what a bore… what this film has more than others is authenticity. Despite being a film, the fact that it's performed by ordinary people playing themselves gives it a high degree of authenticity, of realism that is not usually present in a film, no matter how realistic you want to make it.

I can't say why it even won the GOLDEN LION in Venice. Maybe because a film like this "creates culture", maybe because it thus elevates the cinema of this little Italy which for the past 30 years has been rather rubbish, with few exceptions. Or maybe it's me who "didn't get it." Given that I'm actually a Roman from Rome, I might even know some of these realities.

That said, I'll end this "review" which perhaps isn't even a review. I just wanted to give the "LA" to you DeBaserians so that you can discuss it if you have the time and desire.

cheers