''L'immensità'' () is a 2022

drama Drama is the specific Mode (literature), mode of fiction Mimesis, represented in performance: a Play (theatre), play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on Radio drama, radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a g ...

film directed by

Emanuele Crialese Emanuele Crialese (; born 27 May 1965) is an Italian screenwriter and film director. He is a native of Rome and studied filmmaking in New York City. Early life Emanuele Crialese was born on 26 July 1965 in Rome to Sicilian parents. He studied fil ...

, who co-wrote the screenplay with Francesca Manieri and Vittorio Moroni. It stars

Penélope Cruz Penélope Cruz Sánchez (born 28 April 1974) is a Spanish actress. Prolific in Spanish and English-language films, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, BAFTA Award, a David di Donatello and three Goya Awards. Cru ...

, Luana Giuliani and

Vincenzo Amato Vincenzo Amato (born 30 March 1966) is an Italian actor and sculptor. Life and career Born in Palermo as the son of the stage director and folk musician Emma Muzzi Loffredo, after high school Amato moved to Rome, where his mother lived. Alway ...

. An

international co-production A co-production is a joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint vent ...

between Italy and France, the film follows a dysfunctional family in Italy in the 1970s.

Synopsis

In 1970s Rome, Clara is a nonconformist Spanish expatriate trapped in a loveless marriage to Felice, an unfaithful and abusive businessman, with whom she has three children: Adriana, Gino and Diana. Their eldest child, 12-year-old Adriana, experiences

gender dysphoria Gender dysphoria (GD) is the distress a person experiences due to inconsistency between their gender identitytheir personal sense of their own genderand their sex assigned at birth. The term replaced the previous diagnostic label of gender i ...

. Adriana rejects girlhood and instead identifies as a boy, wearing boys' clothes and adopting the masculine name Andrea. One day, Andrea befriends Sara, a

Romani Romani may refer to: Ethnic groups * Romani people, or Roma, an ethnic group of Indo-Aryan origin ** Romani language, an Indo-Aryan macrolanguage of the Romani communities ** Romanichal, Romani subgroup in the United Kingdom * Romanians (Romanian ...

girl who knows him as a boy. Upon a shared sense of being outsiders, Andrea and Clara grow closer.

Cast

Production

The screenplay was written by Crialese, Francesca Manieri and Vittorio Moroni. An Italian-French co-production, ''L'immensità'' was produced by Wildside, Warner Bros. Entertainment Italia, Chapter 2,

Pathé Pathé SAS (; styled as PATHÉ!) is a French major film production and distribution company, owning a number of cinema chains through its subsidiary Pathé Cinémas and television networks across Europe. It is the name of a network of Fren ...

, and

France 3 Cinéma France 3 () is a French free-to-air public television network. The second flagship network of France Télévisions, it broadcasts a wide range of general and specialized programming. France 3 is structured as a regional service with 13 re ...

Release

The film had its

world premiere A premiere, also spelled première, (from , ) is the debut (first public presentation) of a work, i.e. play, film, dance, musical composition, or even a performer in that work. History Raymond F. Betts attributes the introduction of the film ...

at the

79th Venice International Film Festival The 79th annual Venice International Film Festival was held from 31 August to 10 September 2022, at Venice Lido in Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Eur ...

on 4 September 2022. It was released theatrically in Italy on 15 September 2022 by

Warner Bros. Pictures Warner Bros. Pictures is an American film studio and distribution arm of the Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group division of Warner Bros., both of which are owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. It is headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex ...

and in France on 11 January 2023 by

Pathé Films Pathé SAS (; styled as PATHÉ!) is a French major film production and distribution company, owning a number of cinema chains through its subsidiary Pathé Cinémas and television networks across Europe. It is the name of a network of Fren ...

Reception

On the

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, ''L'Immensità'' holds an approval rating of 83% based on 59 reviews, with an average rating of 6.6/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "''L'immensità'' can be excessively immense at times but with an always superlative Penélope Cruz at its core, this vibrant coming-of-age story with undeniable heart is a memorable experience."

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which uses a

weighted average The weighted arithmetic mean is similar to an ordinary arithmetic mean (the most common type of average), except that instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others. The ...

, assigned the film a score of 70 out of 100, based on 19 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Leslie Felperin of ''

The Hollywood Reporter ''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...

'' summed the film up as "a vibrant, if over-crammed, family affair." For ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'', Guy Lodge writes that the film "is too palpably pained and heartfelt to be called slight, but it's sensitive and peculiar in ways that feel fragile".

Robbie Collin Robbie Collin is a British film critic. Collin studied aesthetics and the philosophy of film at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. He edited the university's student newspaper, '' The Saint''. Collin has been the chief film critic at ''The ...

, writing for ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

'', rated the film four out of five stars, deeming the "surprisingly autobiographical" picture to be "a child's-eye-view portrait of domestic sadness and the craving for escape from it". Wendy Ide of ''

Screen Daily ''Screen International'' is a British film magazine covering the international film business. It is published by Media Business Insight, a British B2B media company which also owned '' Broadcast''. The magazine is primarily aimed at those involv ...

'' highlighted Cruz's performance as "a cross between

Sophia Loren Sofia Costanza Brigida Villani Scicolone (; born 20 September 1934), known professionally as Sophia Loren ( , ), is an Italian actress, active in her native country and the United States. With a career spanning over 70 years, she is one of the ...

and a solar flare". Stephanie Bunbury of ''

Deadline Hollywood ''Deadline Hollywood'', commonly known as ''Deadline'' and also referred to as ''Deadline.com'', is an online news site founded as the news blog ''Deadline Hollywood Daily'' by Nikki Finke in 2006. It is updated several times a day, with en ...

'' considered that deep down, the film "is fundamentally quite bleak, but it wears a delightfully cheerful face".

Accolades

, - , rowspan = "4" , , , 31st Actors and Actresses Union Awards , , Best Actress in an International Production , , Penélope Cruz , , , , , - , rowspan = "3" , 68th David di Donatello Awards , ,

Best Original Screenplay The Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is the Academy Award (also known as an Oscar) for the best screenplay not based upon previously published material. It was created in 1940 as a separate writing award from the Academy Award for Best ...

, , Emanuele Crialese, Francesca Manieri, Vittorio Moroni , , , , rowspan = "3" , , - ,

Best Actress Best Actress is the name of an award which is presented by various film, television and theatre organisations, festivals, and people's awards to leading actresses in a film, television series, television film or play. The first Best Actress award ...

, , Penélope Cruz , , , - , Best Hairstyling , , Daniela Tartari , ,

Notes

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Immensita, (film) L' 2022 drama films 2022 LGBTQ-related films 2022 films 2020s coming-of-age drama films 2020s French films 2020s Italian films 2020s Italian-language films 2020s LGBTQ-related drama films Films about dysfunctional families Films about trans men Films set in Rome Films set in the 1970s France 3 Cinéma films French coming-of-age drama films French LGBTQ-related films Italian coming-of-age drama films Italian LGBTQ-related films Italian-language French films LGBTQ-related coming-of-age drama films Chapter 2 films Pathé films Warner Bros. films