About Happy as Lazzaro
Alice Rohrwacher's Happy as Lazzaro (2018) is a mesmerizing blend of social realism and magical fable that earned the Cannes Best Screenplay award. The film follows Lazzaro, a preternaturally kind young peasant living with his family in the isolated rural community of Inviolata, who are kept in feudal servitude by the manipulative Marquise Alfonsina de Luna. Rohrwacher crafts a visually stunning and tonally unique work where Lazzaro's saintly innocence becomes a mirror reflecting the corruption and exploitation around him.
The narrative takes an astonishing turn midway through, employing a magical realist device that transports Lazzaro decades forward in time while preserving his unchanged purity. This structural leap transforms the film from a specific critique of Italian sharecropping into a timeless parable about modernity, capitalism, and the erosion of human connection. Adriano Tardiolo delivers a remarkable performance in his acting debut, embodying Lazzaro with a quiet, luminous presence that anchors the film's increasingly surreal developments.
Rohrwacher's direction masterfully balances gritty realism with dreamlike sequences, creating a cinematic experience that feels both grounded and transcendent. The supporting cast, particularly Nicoletta Braschi as the calculating baroness, provides excellent counterpoints to Lazzaro's guilelessness. With its 7.5 IMDb rating and critical acclaim, Happy as Lazzaro offers viewers a profoundly original meditation on goodness in a corrupted world. This Italian-Swiss-French-German co-production represents contemporary European cinema at its most inventive and socially engaged.
The narrative takes an astonishing turn midway through, employing a magical realist device that transports Lazzaro decades forward in time while preserving his unchanged purity. This structural leap transforms the film from a specific critique of Italian sharecropping into a timeless parable about modernity, capitalism, and the erosion of human connection. Adriano Tardiolo delivers a remarkable performance in his acting debut, embodying Lazzaro with a quiet, luminous presence that anchors the film's increasingly surreal developments.
Rohrwacher's direction masterfully balances gritty realism with dreamlike sequences, creating a cinematic experience that feels both grounded and transcendent. The supporting cast, particularly Nicoletta Braschi as the calculating baroness, provides excellent counterpoints to Lazzaro's guilelessness. With its 7.5 IMDb rating and critical acclaim, Happy as Lazzaro offers viewers a profoundly original meditation on goodness in a corrupted world. This Italian-Swiss-French-German co-production represents contemporary European cinema at its most inventive and socially engaged.
