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BEL CINEMA!

Mid-August Lunch

GIANNI DI GREGORIO
Italy, 2008, 75 minutes, Color

Winner of audience awards and other accolades at festivals from Bratislava and Bologna, Mid-August Lunch is a mellow gem of a film, and represents a modest triumph for Di Gregorio, who co-wrote Matteo Garrone's Gomorrah. Sixtyish Gianni (writer-director Gianni Di Gregorio) and his 93-year-old mother Valeria are looking forward to celebrating Italy's summer holiday Ferragosto in the flat they share in Rome's Trastevere district. But before you can say "put out another plate," Gianni's conniving landlord persuades the genial good son into caring for his own mother Marina and Aunt Maria for two nights. When his doctor chum foists his mother on him so he can take a lucrative night shift, Gianni finds himself with a full house. "We do this gladly, but up to a point," Valeria explains sensibly, and from this tension springs sublime, humanistic comedy. —Eddie Cockrell

In Italian with English subtitles

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