LAMERICA
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1996 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): * 1/2
LAMERICA is a bleak picture about modern day Albania, which is an oxymoron. The Albania shown in this film, which I have no reason to believe is inaccurate, is a dreary place of abject poverty - sort of the antithesis of a vacation haven. Shows about measurable conditions can be interesting and rewarding. Consider TAXI DRIVER, TO LIVE, GERMINAL, BRAZIL, and STALINGRAD among others. LAMERICA's purpose, on the other hand, seems to be to shock us with the poverty while weaving an opaque tale.
The show starts promisingly with great old newsreel footage of the Italians taking over impoverished Albania in the 1930s. They merged the countries for the duration of the war.
The film then switches to 1991 in Albania when the chains of Communism are finally broken. This means that foreigners are free to come in and bring their money, but since most of the same corrupt politicians are in power, Albanian buses are stopped at the borders to prevent Albanians from leaving. The show has a plethora of scenes of the staring masses either charging for food donations like animals of sitting around staring at the strange foreigners with morbid fascination.
Into this land of despair comes two Italian con men named Fiore (Michele Placido) and his assistant Gino (Enrico Lo Verso who was excellent in FARINELLI). Their specialty is taking money from the Italian government ostensibly for relief work for building factories in third world countries. They skim most of the money off of the top and use the rest to buy a little equipment for the factories.
Their last company was in Nigeria where their specialty was not building televisions sets. They never even built one, but they couldn't be held accountable if those Nigerians did not prove to be successful television set factory workers.
In Albania they go looking for an anti-Communist hero to appoint as the titular head of their shell company. They search in an ex-prison that has been turned into an old age home. The old age homes are dark and worse than most concentration camp pictures I have seen. The people all have a quarter of an inch of caked on dirt, they walk like zombies from a low budget horror picture, and many have missing limbs. The con men find a senile, 80 year old named Spiro Tozai, a.k.a. Michele Talarico (Carmelo Di Mazzarelli), who says he is 20, and they make him the chairman of their firm. The film is by director Gianni Amelio, who did the unusual STOLEN CHILDREN, and the influence from that film shows in the old age home scene.
The script by Gianni Amelio, Andrea Porporati, and Alessandro Sermoneta is overly earnest and not very memorable, but it does have one good line I remember. When Gino is at the big hotel in Albania, he tells his Albanian contact Selimi (Piro Milkani) that he is going to take a shower. Selimi gives him that not-in-this-country-you-don't look, and explains, "Sorry. No water today. Today holiday. Maybe tomorrow."
The rest of the show focuses in on Gino chasing Spiro as he tries to escape to Italy. The other part of the plot is that Spiro has a fairly easy to guess secret which Gino finds out about. The show can be quite mean spirited as young kids, about age 7, steal Spiro's shoes and then put him in a hut where they try to torture and asphyxiate him with torches and smoke. They do not manage to kill him, but they come close. I was not impressed with any of the acting, but Carmelo Di Mazzarelli's performance was the most obscure and least effective of the bunch.
LAMERICA runs way too long at 1:55. It is in Italian and some Albanian, all with English subtitles. The film is not rated. Given some of the strong images and the adult themes, it would probably get an R, but perhaps it could qualify for a PG-13. It would be fine for any teenager. This is the sort of art house film with which many critics and art house patrons resonate. To me, however, it is nothing more than a chronology of poverty without a compelling script. I know the writers and director wanted me to feel sorry for the Albanians. I do. More than that, I see little purpose in the film. You can overpraise a bad artistic film and no one will care, but dislike an earnest one like this, and people are up in arms over the critic's "stupidity." I once gave a mediocre review to BURNT BY THE SUN, and I think half the Russians in the world wrote me unflattering letters. Finally, I give the film * 1/2 for its seriousness.
**** = One of the top few films of this or any year. A must see film. *** = Excellent show. Look for it. ** = Average movie. Kind of enjoyable. * = Poor show. Don't waste your money. 0 = One of the worst films of this or any year. Totally unbearable.
REVIEW WRITTEN ON: May 13, 1996
Opinions expressed are mine and not meant to reflect my employer's.
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