Parthenope (Celeste Dalla Porta), born in the sea of Naples in 1950, searches for happiness over the long summers of her youth, falling in love with her home city and its many memorable characters. From Academy Award-winning filmmaker Paolo Sorrentino comes to monumental and deeply romantic story of a lifetime.
Oscar-winning filmmaker Paolo Sorrentino offers us the monumental and deeply romantic story of a life with Parthenope, an intellectual film.
Napoli (Naples), the Free City
It is said that Naples is free, Naples is dangerous, Naples never judges. Naples is like Parthenope. From there comes the premise of Parthenope.
Like the director’s hometown, his young heroine is a free woman. Her freedom is a constant, which she will never give up. Even if it means accepting solitude. Because too often, solitude and freedom go hand in hand.
Parthenope (Celeste Dalla Porta) | Photo by Gianni Fiorito
Throughout the film, the vision of Napoli will come back in the mouths of the characters. But these same characters will never judge Parthenope for her way of life.
Yet the parallel is striking when we pay attention. But perhaps it is the spectators who will pass judgment on this free woman. The director does not hesitate, moreover, to put her in situations that show that she does not conform to the norms. But is it simply because she is Neapolitan?
Whatever it may be, she pushes the audacity not only to have an abortion, but she becomes a university professor while men still dominate these positions. She loves who she wants and in the way she wants, even if it is destructive for her partners.
Because the real themes of this film are freedom and the great city of southwestern Italy, Naples.
An Intellectual Film
As usual, Sorrentino offers an intellectual film that will not necessarily please the average citizen. A bit like La grande bellezza, Parthenope is a film that relies on dialogues and exchanges between the characters. The director leaves a lot of room so that the viewer can interpret the actions of the characters himself.
Parthenope (Celeste Dalla Porta), Sandrino (Dario Aita) and Raimondo (Daniele Rienzo) | Photo by Gianni Fiorito
Moreover, he asks big questions in this film. These questions are addressed to the heroine, but also to the viewer. “Do you love too much or not enough?” a character, half-demon, half-saint, asks her at one point. He asks us all. She doesn’t know what to answer. Neither do we. Because all the questions have already been asked and all the answers have proved to be ambiguous, evasive, contradictory.
The director also explains that for him, this film is above all about the sacred.
“For me, Parthenope is, above all, a film about the sacred. About all the things that a woman has not been able to forget in her seventy-three years of life: the Bay of Naples and her parents, her first loves—one pure and bright, the other sordid and unspeakable—the perfect Capri summer, carefree with its salty dawns, still mornings, and balmy nights; those fleeting, fateful encounters; the discovery of seduction and the dizziness of freedom; feeling so fully alive that she sighs at life’s exuberance; the desperate search for her true self; loves lost or barely tasted; the sorrows that plunge her into adulthood; the inexorable passing of time; the only lover who never leaves her.”
Thus, we come to feel a kind of fatalism. Youth is exciting, but once an adult, we must return to the ranks and live a boring life. But do we really have to?
That is the question that Sorrentino asks.
The answer belongs to each of us.
A Little More…
Although Parthenope is not a film that will please everyone, it is easy to watch. And despite its 2h17, it passes quickly.
Parthenope (Celeste Dalla Porta) | Photo by Gianni Fiorito
The story is timeless and, although it is situated in a fairly specific culture, it remains accessible.
Once again, Sorrento finds the right rhythm and tone to tell an intellectual story without giving an impression of snobbery.
And, once again, he demonstrates his importance in the rich history of Italian cinema.
