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Italy · 2020
1h 29m
Director Emma Dante
Starring Viola Pusatieri, Eleonora De Luca, Simona Malato, Susanna Piraino
Genre Drama
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Five sisters in Palermo, Sicily. From childhood to old age. The sophomore feature by the Italian director Emma Dante. Based on her own stage play.
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Clearly a deeply personal project for the director, it radiates utmost sincerity, rendering the more baroque parts palatable, if not as affecting as they were clearly intended to be. Within 90 despondent minutes, Dante encapsulates a plethora of themes and ideas, and that by itself merits plaudits.
The New York Times by Beatrice Loayza
[Emma Dante] imagines the ripple effects of a sister’s death across generations with metaphysical grace and hints of fantasy, straying from the plot-reliant mold of most human dramas toward something more haunting and powerful.
The Hollywood Reporter by Deborah Young
Both touching and universally understandable, the theme is how an untimely death destroys the fragile fabric that binds a family together.
To imagine the decades-long catch-and-release sweep of a single lifespan and condense it into one sub-90-minute film is a feat; to do so about multiple interconnected lives without losing definition is even more impressive.
Austin Chronicle by Josh Kupecki
Is there such a thing as too much pathos? Trick question, because there is not. So, should you find yourself a bit emotionally imbalanced these days, and the aggressively optimistic charms of Ted Lasso have proven to be a placebo, come see how the other half lives and seek out The Macaluso Sisters, a beautiful bummer that is the perfect elixir of Aristotelian purgation, and a restorative for your soul.
It’s a film that rises above a few heavy-handed directorial touches to weave, over its admirably lean running time, a tapestry of sisterly bonds and fissures that also has plenty to say about the film’s setting, the dense, oppressive urban Palermo.
RogerEbert.com by Monica Castillo
There’s a strange peace and acceptance in the film, painful as it is, that life did not work out in favor of the youthful hopes and dreams of its characters. Perhaps it’s because so many of us have had to mourn some sort of loss and move on with our lives like the family.
The Guardian by Peter Bradshaw
The movie has a streak of sentimentality amid its melancholy and a certain formal theatricality: director Emma Dante has adapted the movie from her own stage play, but has opened it out very plausibly and cinematically.
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