Monday evening I went to the cinema to see “Tale of Tales” by Matteo Garrone. The film is taken from the collection of fairy tales “Pentamerone” by Giambattista Basile.
The film is a mix of three episodes:
- The first concerns a royal couple who can not have children. The queen is ready to do anything to have it relies on one necromancer who tells him that she will have to eat the heart of sea dragon that must be cooked to a virgin. In recovering the hearts the king dies. However the Queen concurrently with the virgin who had cooked the heart becomes pregnant. The story takes sixteen years later. The queen’s son, Elias, and the son of the servant, Jonah, are very similar and are inseparable friends. The queen tries in every way to separate them, but when Jonah will be in danger Elias leaves the building to run to his aid. But it will take sacrifice the queen to save the two boys.
The second episode concerns another royal family. King develops a special relationship with a flea, which became every day more and more fat and it ends up dying. Meanwhile Princess Viola is so eager to marry the father organizes a particular tournament: only those who can guess which animal belongs to the skin of his now dead animal may win marry his daughter. In this way, Violet ends in marriage with an “ogre”. She will come to kill him to get rid of and then go home.- The latest episode is two old ladies who never leave their home. But one day the song of one of the two bewitches the king but can not face her. The king tries to seduce her, but Dora asks him a deal: she will be willing to a night of love with him, if everything will be in complete darkness. However the king at night lights a candle to look at her while sleeping and scared orders the guards to throw it out the window. Dora save the branches of the trees and with the help of a woman to make her resume breastfeeding. This means that the day after Dora wakes up young and beautiful. Dora ends up marrying the king who obviously does not recognize it anymore. However the spell will fade with time.
The film from the point of photography and costumes is really well done and I would say just fabulous. However, as they were interwoven stories and dialogues let me down, even bored. The only question he asked himself at the end is if all those places that he see in the film really exist. Well, yes. The film was shot entirely in Italy and I must say that is the only thing that did not made me regret the cost of the ticket.
