50
This sentimental movie is the simulacrum of an existential family drama. But the 48-year-old Morante is the real thing.
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What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
70
While Muccino has refined his technique over four features and has developed greater insight, his characteristic tendency toward hysteria remains. This keeps the drama fast and compelling, but also makes it slightly wearing at times.
75
Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
Very well acted and directed, if overlong.
40
If it were less prone to soap-opera histrionics, this screechy saga of an upscale family collapsing under the weight of its members' self-absorption might have something worth saying about domestic politics in post-fascist, post-communist, post-socialist Italy.
40
The Hollywood Reporter by Frank Scheck
Achieves the dubious distinction of featuring a large gallery of nearly all unlikable characters.
60
It's alternately stimulating and exhausting.
40
Los Angeles Times by Kenneth Turan
A decorative Italian soap opera with an asterisk for earnest aspirations. Its beautiful people say painful things to each other in gorgeous clothes, and though the film expects us to take their problems seriously, it's awfully hard to do so.
50
Long-winded and often over-the-top Italian soap opera about a neurotic, middle-class Roman family.
60
The New York Times by Stephen Holden
An abrasive but innovative fusion of farce, satire and drama that blurs their boundaries in uncomfortable ways. It's a noisy movie whose characters tend to talk at medium-to-high volume.