Commentary , Year in Review. Another way in which this Year in Bedlam differs from its predecessors is in the self-imposed rules about my movie choices. So with that out of the wayβ¦. Joska, we learn, has been separated from his Jewish parents, and left to wander from one horrific situation to the next.
Literally everyone Joska meetsβsuperstitious peasants, corrupt priests, sadistic educators and trigger-happy military men allied and otherwise βis petty, ignorant, depraved or all three, leading to abuse of every conceivable stripe. Roberto Benigni plays Gepetto, a genial fellow looking to become a puppeteer. This puppet-boy, alas, is a bit of a twerp who impulsively wanders off to explore a world in which animals can talk and, as we all know, is afflicted with a nose that grows whenever he tells a lie.
Pinocchio, as played by Federico Ielapi, is a marvelous creation: his carved wooden surface is convincingly rendered with visible wood grain and very human eyes, while the many talking animals who turn up are depicted as humans with animal features or vice-versa.
Like that film, this one melds an imaginatively minimalistic premise with transcendent intelligence and a social conscience, with wealth inequality, racism and collectivity all factored in. The overriding theme is, simply, sustenance, a subject that has never been more forcefully or provocatively explored.
The setting is a multi-level enclosure built around a vast hole, whose most noteworthy feature is a platform filled with gourmet food that descends from the top of the structure, leaving progressively less food for the inhabitants of the lower levels.
