The director also pulls career-high performances from Mezzogiorno and Timi that are, respectively, tragic and mesmerizing.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
Bellocchio gets the opera-buffa and the carnival side of Italian Fascism, and parts of the movie are excruciatingly funny.
New York Daily News by Joe Neumaier
There’s visual poetry here and haunted performances from Mezzogiorno and Timi -- who plays two roles, and is especially gripping as Dalser’s grown son.
Almost as an afterthought to the ringingly true performances--and Marco Bellocchio’s unusually approachable direction--comes a deft analysis of fascism, likened to lovesickness, insanity and a gust of orchestral strings. It’s all of that and more, not to mention a lousy matchmaker.
The New York Times by Manohla Dargis
A sustained, alternatingly exhausting and aesthetically exhilarating howl of a film.
Vincere starts to run dry of stunning visual gambits and become redundant in its second hour, as the madhouse sequences dominate, but Bellocchio’s central premise retains its power and poignancy throughout.
Boxoffice Magazine by Steve Ramos
Forty-four years after his exciting debut feature "Fists in the Pocket," Italian filmmaker Marco Bellocchio continues his late-career renaissance with the passionate, beautifully crafted, period melodrama Vincere.
Daniele Cipri's highly stylized lensing and Carlo Crivelli's bold score add to the movie's flamboyant aura. But then, the story of a bombastic dictator deserves a bombastic telling.