Pulcinella, a foolish servant, is sent from the depths of Mt. Vesuvius to present-day Campania to grant the last wish of poor shepherd Tommaso, who spent his whole life looking after a crumbling Bourbon estate: his mission is to save a young buffalo named Sarchiapone. Pulcinella takes the buffalo north and the two servants, man and beast, travel through a beautiful and lost Italy.
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Reviews
Sadly Over-hyped
Don't Believe the Hype
Absolutely Brilliant!
I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.
The director was faced with a problem when the subject of his initial movie died part way through filming. His subject - the volunteer caretaker of the palace of Carditello spends years cleaning up rubbish on that site. We watch him do some of this but there is no real interaction until he rescues a male buffalo calf who has been left to die.The story then switches narrators and it is the calf who takes over the story. There is some weird setup involving a mythical Pulcinella character which is used as the bridging story to switch timelines. I saw this in a festival because it was Italian and it sounded like it would be unusual. Perhaps those familiar with Italian culture would understand more about the Pulcinella character who seems to regain his soul later in the movie although I couldn't be sure. There are some great ideas here. If I had been the editor I would have dropped most of the caretaker sequence as that raises more questions than it answers and the film should have been much shorter.
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