MID-AUGUST LUNCH (Gianni Di Gregorio). 75 minutes. Subtitled. Opens Friday (May 21). For venues, trailers and times, see Movies.
A slight but carefully crafted work, Mid-August Lunch takes place over the Ferragosto holiday weekend, mostly confining itself to a small Italian apartment where the middle-aged Gianni (writer/director Gianni Di Gregorio) lives with his aged mother (Valeria De Franciscis).[rssbreak]
They’re comfortable, but money is getting tight – Gianni’s behind on his rent and hasn’t paid the electric bill in three years – so when the landlord offers to forgive Gianni’s debt if he can leave his own elderly mother with them for the holiday, he grudgingly accepts. But then a second guest arrives. And a third.
Gian Enrico Bianchi’s camera insinuates us into the activity as Gianni attempts to balance the demands of four elderly women, making a meal everyone can eat, juggling their medications and sleeping schedules. Mid-August Lunch isn’t the stuff of high drama – the closest it comes to a plot twist is a moment when someone is discovered gobbling some leftover pasta al forno – but it tells its simple story lightly and with great affection for its characters.
Expect to leave the theatre hungry.
