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Rating: Vermiglio
It is a beautiful film, well-directed with many interesting elements. An immersion into a world that seems ancient but is actually not so temporally distant from our present day.
The setting, cinematography, and character development of the various characters are very well done. All the children are excellent, even those who appear only for a few moments on screen. A great deal of work has been put into them.
Ample space is dedicated to female figures; all three sisters are well-defined, with the second sister, Ada, being particularly interesting in a somewhat unique role, tormented in spirit probably by a nature of her own that she cannot decipher.
Even though the story is centered around the events of Lucia, the eldest sister, it is a choral film. The space dedicated to the patriarchal teacher is perhaps the largest in terms of screen time, but all the other performers find their precise place and a more than sufficient narrative dimension.
Some themes are sketched out, sometimes briefly, but always with great effectiveness such as the condition of soldiers in war (without ever showing it), "living as if it were not life," infant mortality, the food of the soul, the patriarchal world, but also the relationships among the members of the small mountain community, solidarity, attachment to religious traditions, which at that time, more for better than for worse, served as a humanitarian bond among these people.
Perhaps the only disturbing element in the unfolding of the story is the brief journey outside the alpine valley, which breaks the isolation but is treated a bit too hastily to give sense to the final narrative twist. A solution without movements would have been more rigorous, but it is a triviality that does not alter the value of the film.
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