Awesome Movie

Admirable film.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Beautifully directed and beautifully shot film from Francesco Rosi. From the wonderfully framed shot behind the opening credits at the very start I was enchanted and fascinated. A simple enough tale of an old man calling his three sons to his isolated farmhouse following the death of their mother. The three are all at work in the modern world and we gather it is rare that they meet up or visit their childhood home. Contrasts abound between the three and their father and their differing lifestyles. The judgmental judge, the utopian carer for delinquent boys and the militant factory worker (all representing facets of the director's personality, he is said to have claimed) all discuss the way they see the world and more especially their homeland, then being torn apart by assassinations, corruption and union and mafia intervention. Pastoral and yet vigorous with the undercurrents of pessimism and loss of hope and search for love are very well handled and make for absorbing viewing.

The disturbing opening scene is a nightmare that Rocco Giuranna is having. The rats that are scavenging a trash site seem to herald what he and his two brothers will face as the three come together because the death of their mother. Rocco is a social worker living in a state reformatory where he is in charge of young boys that are in the institution to be re-educated. Unfortunately, they will probably will go to be hard criminals when they are released from the Naples correctional facility.Raffaele, the older brother, is a judge in Rome. He has been asked to preside over an important case coming to trial that involves local terrorists. Italy was living harsh days at the time and judges were the target for paid assassins or revolutionaries with an agenda for eliminating those that dared to speak against them. The upcoming trial has a profound effect on Raffaele's wife, who knows it probably means the death of her husband.The third brother, Nicola, is a factory worker. Like his brothers, he fled the poor South of Italy in search for a better future in Torino. What he finds is unhappiness as he rebels against the firm he feels is enslaving him and his co-workers. His marriage has suffered because his wife has cheated on him and they are separated.It is at this junction that all three brothers are summoned to come home as their mother has died. Donato, the older father, is lost, as he ponders what is going to become of him. His memories of happier times, with the woman he adored, keep flooding back to him as his three sons come home to mourn for their loss. The three brothers, in turn, are haunted by their own memories of their present lives and their youth in the small town in Puglia before they left home.Francesco Rosi, adapted Andrei Platonov's novel "The Third Son", together with Tonino Guerra, one of the best writers in the Italian cinema. Mr. Rosi, a director who shows an affinity for presenting ordinary people in difficult situations in their lives, scored a big success with this film. He knows these characters. The director makes an enormous contribution in the way he deals with the emotions of the principals in this film about the love of the land, on the one hand of Donato, the father, and the restlessness of the three sons that abandoned their birth place in search of a better living. Rosi's triumph is in showing us that ultimately, it's Donato, the father, the one that stayed behind who is the one that lived a better life than their three sons.The director achieves a triumph in the way he directed the four principals in the film. Philippe Noiret, Michele Placido, and Vittorio Mezzogiorno do an excellent job in bringing to life, Raffaele, Nicola and Rocco. It is however Charles Vanel, the veteran French actor who stays with the viewer because of his exquisite portrayal of the older Donato. Mr. Vanel hardly utters a word throughout the movie, yet, his presence is so powerful that at times one tends to forget the others. Mr. Vanel's Donato is one of the best creations in his long film career in France.Pasqualino DiSantis' cinematography captures the essence of what Francesco Rosi was looking for. The director and his photographer were well attuned indeed. Ruggero Mastroianni's film editing shows once more his elegant style of putting the material together. Francesco Rosi is the one that brought all the elements together in this dramatic and satisfactory film.

"Three Brothers" (Italian, 1980): An extremely melancholy movie – more like the depression of a Swedish film or the ennui of a French film, than anything typically Italian. Three estranged brothers receive word their Mother has died. Daily lives are put on hold, and each heads to the "country" for the funeral, their Father, and to reacquaint with one another in the village of their childhood. The three are shown in forgiving contrast to their Father, one of the son's daughters, and the old family dog. Think of this movie as a trim, non-commercial, patient, personal, very thoughtful "Big Chill". The scoring was perfectly sad and delicate throughout…you will not want to get up and dance. However, unlike a Swedish film, "Three Brothers" does slowly reveal glimmers of acceptance and hope.

This film made during the late seventies studies how a family deals with the death of their martriarch. I found myself relatively bored watching the film but I was impressed with the amount of detail that went into developing the characters. What is most impressive is how the filmmaker concentrates on the differences in generations. That is to say the filmmaker compares and contrasts each caracter with where they were born, when, and how they were brought up.If you are in the mood for a sit back and rest type of film this is not it. But if you want a thinker, you've met your match.