Emir Kusturica
A gothic and extravagant comedy, signed by the Serbian director Emir Kusturica -known for his surreal political art films- able to arouse in the audience, laughter and tears, laughter and melancholy, lightheartedness and restlessness. The plot unfolds on a series of characters dreams that reflect their personality, reveal their fears, reveal their soul. One's of Jhonny Depp's early roles, and just as quirky as anything he has ever done. He plays a young man that has recently tided up his life troubled by the tragic death of his parents, when he is visited by his cousin, played by Vincent Gallo (Paul), who matches him quirk for quirk and than by the uncle Leo (Jerry Lewis) who runs Arizona's biggest Cadillac dealership, and wants the boy in the business with him.
In addition enter the faboulous Faye Dunaway (Elaine) a no longer young woman who has killed her husband and now is stepmother to Lili Tayolr (Grace) who is obsessed from a death wish mania. Axel falls in love with Elaine and moves to her. But over time things change their route. Keeping an extremely surreal humor and a funeral underlying bitterness superbly balanced, Mr.Kusturica, perfectly portray the key passage of protagonist that becomes a man only when he clashes with the many difficulties of life.
The film lives on the confrontation sometimes harsh, other ruthless between nature and civilization, between being as such and its counterpart purified of all naivety and educated to the culture of superstructures in which we live. Axel, as repeats several times Paul, is the latest of american dreamers an immature, one would say, if it were not that this, according to Kusturica, is the best condition that allows to gain other aspects of existence thus losing the over-structurated aspects. His ability to always go out of lines without being unpleasant, his moments of high tension where the forces of nature are unleashed, the usual suicide attempts by hanging that are always resolved with ridicule of the suicidal aspirant, the ability to portray the characters on the brink of imbalance and make them real, sanguine, lovable.
Arizona Dream
director EMIR KUSTURICA
year 1993
director of photography VILKO FILAC
cast JOHNNY DEPP, JERRY LEWIS, VINCENT GALLO, LILI TAYLOR
words GAIA MERCELLI
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