★★★½☆
Deep Blue, on the surface, can be described as a slow-burning Italian crime drama. Underneath, it’s a character-driven family drama exploring generational violence, abandonment, resentment, and guilt. All leading to one overarching question: Can a son escape the sins of his father?
The story, co-written by Lorenzo Marinelli and Ernesto Maria Censori, follows Nicola, who, after twenty years, learns that his father isn’t dead.
He returns to Italy from Mexico to confront his father for sending him away as a child after forcing him to kill a man in cold blood.
The film opens with a violent and horrendous act forced upon a child, then spends the rest of its runtime showing that character as an adult living with the consequences of his father’s actions.
Lorenzo Marinelli and Ernesto Maria Censori’s script feels as if it’s trying to craft a character study of childhood trauma and its lingering, hindering effects into adulthood.
On some levels, this approach works. Almost as if we’re offered an inside look at Mathilda’s life after Léon dies and Tony sends her to that private boarding school. Offering her a life she would have never had, but only after being exposed to unexpected death and carnage.
Nicola is an adult by the time we meet him again. He has a job, a girlfriend, and a stepson whom he doesn’t acknowledge as such.
Even though he means the world to the kid, and he knows it, there is an emotional distance he maintains, not out of resentment but fear. A fear that we don’t quite understand until later in the film.
Structurally, the opening works, giving us the details of his childhood and showcasing the horrors he experienced, along with these sprinkles of joy and true bliss that come full circle.
I feel like having the entire opening sequence play out as flashbacks throughout the film, rather than in chronological order, would have helped balance the film’s tone.
The opening sequence, in which an eleven-year-old boy is sent into an abandoned building to whack a guy, sets up an incredibly misleading narrative.
Censori starts the film on a high note, letting the son change gears from the back seat as he leans into the front of the car, joking and bonding with his father during the drive.
That same approach is taken when they reach the building. The son gets out of the car, walks up to the building, and we hear two gunshots. He then slowly walks out, gets back into the car, and they’re on their way.
While there are minor hints that something is off, particularly as the friend’s facial expression changes when he sees the emotionless kid walking toward them with blood covering his face and shirt, it still feels routine. Just another Tuesday.
The approach to and normalization of killing and bloodshed, even for kids, sets the tone and crafts this monotonous pacing, normalizing extreme behavior in a way that holds the film back.
Opening the film on such a high and intense note, one that is never matched and only briefly clarified through a simple exchange of dialogue in the third act, stunts the film’s ability to flourish.
Samuele De Biase’s score is spot-on throughout the film, offering subtle yet pitch-perfect compositions that accompany each scene beautifully and help balance its tone. Especially in the final sequences, the score, much like in the beginning when the father is teaching his son how to shift gears, has an enriching bassline that captures the essence of the moment without overpowering it.
“An enriching bassline that captures the essence of the moment without overpowering it.”
Andrea Benjamin Manenti’s cinematography is less than perfect, yet offers some of the film’s most beautiful and compelling shots. Part of the messier moments I can’t really blame him for, since they occur near the beginning of the film, when it’s trying to find its footing shortly after the abrupt killing by the child.
The shots that follow are loose, captured with a handheld camera. Not so much that they fall into shaky-cam territory, but the intent seems to be to create an emotionally unstable context, an approach that is inconsistent and short-lived.
The rest of the film offers good, crisp, and well-framed shots, accompanied by some fantastic and beautiful imagery that is top-tier. These are used as transitional moments that help convey and set the tone, particularly the underwater shots and those of the beach.
“Fantastic and beautiful imagery that is top-tier.”
Filippo Timi and Andrea Arcangeli lead a stellar cast, with performances that capture the essence of their characters rather spot-on. Peppe Servillo, while only appearing in a few scenes, really helps establish what the film is and where it’s going.
Despite the issues I have with the opening of the film and the hindering effects it has on the tone and balance throughout, Deep Blue is a compelling character-driven narrative.
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