“Eva” by Pietro Landonio

“Eva” investigates the themes of youth and sexual harassment but behind these focuses , Pietro Landonio made a great choice, to build a moving and powerful tale. The movie, in fact, create a delicate atmosphere of naivety and dream, around which the characters live a carefree journey in the time of a day. Yet, in this idyll, the tension creeps in and the screenwriters express all their ability to create a solid narrative structure, moved on by the strength of dialogues. In the first half of the movie, the two characters are trying to repel each other but, in a dangerous situation, things turn upside down. In this moment, the director is really able in capturing the changing between Eva and Simone: with a breathtaking cinematography and soft camera movements, we see the “almost-lovers” getting closer, bonded by the journey they’re trying to complete.

But the movie seems to suggest that every conquest has a price. Eva is becoming a woman and everything is not so easy like a trip with Simone. Her beauty could be even a weapon in the hands of ruthless and cynical people. In the dramatic epilogue in fact, the director express a strong and moving message about the power of women: every girl is the owner of her body, even if this means to alter it. Nobody should be afraid to loose beauty because love and acceptance comes in other ways. Landonio is not afraid to declare this in a tragic way, using the cinematic tools to the extreme, but never loosing a wise touch and an elegant aesthetics. We are obliged to mention the powerful simbolysm of the movie, that perfectly fit the story, its meanings and the visual implant. The mask Eva wears in the last frames become maybe the real face of her inner soul, bleeding behind a beautiful body.After watching this film, remain mixed but very complex feelings. On the one hand the sweetness of a fairy tale of youth and on the other the awareness that fragility can break any personality. Yet there is perhaps a hope, which, as always, is only accompanied by truth.

A praise to the cinematography and the script.