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These films are presented with support from UW-Madison Department of French and Italian:
The Kidnapping of Arabella
Eight-year-old Arabella is a handful. Desperate to escape a reading being given by her pretentious author-dad (a hilarious Chris Pine, speaking fluent Italian) she meets Holly, an unstable twenty-eight-year old who has just been fired from her dead-end job at a skating rink. Convincing Holly that she is a younger version of herself, Arabella talks her way into a road trip with the ostensible mission of rewriting Holly’s tragic childhood. An absurdist comedy that remains surprisingly and movingly grounded in its lead characters emotional landscapes as they will their way through an impressively seedy series of Italian locales, Arabella offers sly nods to the Coen brothers, Aki Kaurismäki, and Paper Moon, all while heralding the singularly unique style and vision of writer-director Carolina Cavalli. Arabella is Cavalli’s second feature – following 2022’s similarly droll and disarming Amanda – and with it, she further establishes herself as a disarming, distinctive and vibrant filmmaking voice. (BR)
The Last One for the Road
It’s the end of Italy as they know it and Carlobianchi and Doriano feel fine. Well, maybe not fine, but in their past, present and future state of inebriation, they aren’t feeling much of anything at all. Passed out in a car one night in Veneto, the two old friends wake up and decide to drive to the Venice airport (at least they think it’s the Venice airport) to pick up another old friend, Genio, who has been out of the country for decades. Genio has been exiled in Argentina after getting caught stealing and selling sunglasses from the factory the three friends used to work in. As it happens, Carlo and Dori were in on the scheme as well, but Genio took the fall for all of them, and so Carlo and Dori are feeling slightly indebted as they make the decision to pick him up. But first, as always, there is one more drink to be had. Winding their way through a myriad of Americanized dive bars all featuring troubadours of questionable talent, they befriend Giulio, a lovesick young architecture student, and take him under their besotted wings for a woozy, boozy road trip. Filled with memorable characters and moments that zig when you think they will zag, Francesco Sossai’s drunken, droll road comedy carries echoes of Il Sorpasso, Sideways and The Last Detail as it charts an entertaining, decidedly non-linear course through the plains of northern Italy. (BR)