The Son's Room (2001)

its touch is obvious in each scene. but the theme changes the resonance of a well known style. not for dramatic impact but for solution to define it in right manner. for bitter beauty. for the fight of a family to understand. and accept. for the second chance. and for the joy of new perception of life small things. the irony of director is replaced by touching message. about the silhouette of Job looking answer to the pain. and using the question to define himself. like each film by Nanni Moretti,"La stanza del figlio" is a personal confession. and only the manner to define its terms transforms it in universal. because this is the splendid detail who transforms it in a useful story. the realism of testimony about death and hope. about joy and sorrow.about reconstruction of same life in different profound manner.

I was so disappointed by this film. The family relationships and behaviour is deeply unconvincing and badly acted. Giovanni's patients are awkward caricatures and I didn't feel emotionally involved with any of the family or additional characters. It's easy enough to jerk some tears from the viewer with the subject matter of a child dying but when the build up is so clunky and unrealistic it feels like a cheap use of the topic to give the film some substance. An additional character that arrives at the end of the film is so unlikable that I almost couldn't watch till the end. The scene of the family singing in the car (which has been used in many films successfully) goes well beyond the cringe-worthy. If you want to watch a cheesy film then choose an American one - they are much better at it!

I watched this film several years before on TV, but interrupted and left unfinished, this time finally watched in the Febiofest's special program of Nanni Moretti's canon. The general thoughts after watching it in the cinema is that this Cannes' Palme d'Or winner is lagging behind its award-winning prestige, during the whole process, it is difficult to single out any extraordinariness from it, which baffles me so much. The narrative is rather mediocre, any anticipated set piece are orchestrated in a mannered template, leaves a mawkish and maudlin impression of ennui (Brian Ono's BY THE RIVER is overtly pretentious here). The pain of losing one's dearest is a torment could slowly erode one's soul and drop in from time to time, which has nothing unexpectedly thrilling or soothing from the film's exposition. If Moretti could be ranked as the Italian equivalence of Woody Allen, I divine the chief enjoyment should spring from its script and dialogue, in this case it is just as barren and conventional like as other tacky family tearjerkers, in spite of a hotchpotch of various patients of the psychiatrist adds up some emotional bite while being not too sharp-wittedly different from other generic shrink clichés. Compared with QUIET CHAOS (2008), another bereavement drama starring Moretti under the helm of Antonello Grimaldi, which fetches a 7/10, THE SON'S ROOM is a torrent of tepid water, the warmth it heats up is not as unaffected as I had expected. The whole cast did a good job but nothing attracts any special attention, while Laura Morante's tearless grief of losing her only son is over-stagy, ironically Moretti is a much more natural actor by comparison, after all, the film does not deserve his overstated cachet, nor does Nanni Moretti.

This is a well crafted film. The actors are good, especially the women. However, the script is less than inspired. In the first part of the movie we are introduced to Nanni Moretti, a happily married psychiatrist with two teen-aged children, a daughter and a son. Then the son dies in an accident. Given that scenario, in the normal course of events you would expect: despair, denial, guilt, what ifs, marital difficulties, the questioning of life goals, and so forth. And that is exactly what you get. The ending did supply some ambiguity. Just when you though the family was on the road to acceptance and coming back together, they are seen walking on the beach with each one going in a different direction. Nanni's dilemma with staying in his job is nicely set up by several scenes showing what he has to deal with as a psychiatrist. If what is presented is a typical cross section of patients, then it would seem inevitable that a major life crisis would precipitate the shakedown in Nanni's professional life. In fact Nanni was showing some signs of feeling ineffective in being able to help his patients before the tragedy. After having seen what it is like from the other side of the couch, I came away from this movie wondering how a psychiatrist can avoid early burnout.With scenes like the family's last viewing of the body in a casket before it is sealed, it is hard to avoid getting wrapped up in the tragedy that befalls this family, but the emotional investment did not pay off for me in the end. Movies with a similar theme (the loss of a child) that I found more interesting and engaging are, "Ordinary People" and "In the Bedroom."