One day when we were (really) young

harry_tk_yung

The premises of this family could not be more ordinary. The time is summer 1978 and the location rural southern Italy. There's a handsome looking young couple with a perceptive ten-year-old boy Michele and his little sister. The parents love their kids. The father has taken the trouble to develop a little ritual, arm wrestling, as his way to reach his son in communication across the generation gap. The mother is strict, but sensible. Looks like Michele is going to have one of those hazy, lazy summers holidays we remember when we were ten. But then, the parents are involved in a kidnap for ransom engineered by a ringleader form Brazil and involving a few other locals.

The plot is not complicated, but we are let into all these very gradually, through the eyes of Michele, who starts with stumbling across the hole that is the prison of the kidnapped boy Filippo (who happens to be also ten years old).

The most fascinating thing about this movie is seeing everything though the eyes of the ten-year-olds. Regardless of our own age, we probably still remember these summer holidays, when in our child's mind, there is a world of fantasy and adventure as we swing on old tires over a stream or hide in primitive tree houses we constructed. To Michele, the first discovery of Filippo would seem one of those adventures, entirely divorced from the reality of daily life. That is why some of his behaviour seems a little difficult to comprehend. He does not seem too concerned with Filippo's safety or welfare. He does not go to the police.

Filippo, on the other hand, having gone through the trauma of being kidnapped and having been kept in the hole for a long time, thinks that he is already dead, until his "guardian angel" appears. On one of his visits, Michele actually takes Filippo out to spend a good part of the day in the open to prove that he is not dead. But then he takes him back to the hole probably because neither of the boys can think of anything better to do.

Towards the end, reality takes over from fantasy as the movie moves towards being both a thriller and a coming-of-age (the hard way) story.

The director takes time to patiently show us a lot of details which make the movie a full experience instead of a one-dimensional Hollywood-style crafted thriller. For example, we are brought to understand that not every Italian is born knowing what a gondola is, something that never crossed my mind until I watched this movie. He is also very fond of close-up shots of small animals and insects. Whether intentional or not, this has the effect of bringing us closer to the two ten-year-olds' world through bringing us closer to nature. Appropriately, strings are used mostly for background music, as the most versatile instrument that is equally effective in creating a languid mood as in underscoring pulsating excitement. Photography of the expansive golden summer wheat field is simply glorious. The movie is well acted all around, but particularly by Giuseppe Cristiano playing Michele. While this movie has merit in many aspects, what impressed me most is how uncannily it recalls into our heart what it's like being a ten-year-old.

score /10

harry_tk_yung 3 September 2005

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1164119/