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CANNES 2008 Directors' FortnightItaly

Munzi's night of fear

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A robbery in a villa at the outskirts of a large northern Italian city. A robbery that goes wrong. A story like many others, to which the TV news have accustomed us. Yet behind every story are human beings.

Behind Francesco Munzi’s The Rest of the Night [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, selected in the Directors' Fortnight, is an Italian coke-addict and drifter (the exceptional Stefano Cassetti of Cédric Kahn’s 2001 film Roberto Succo), a Romanian thief in love (Constantin Lupescu), his younger brother (Victor Cosma) and the young Romanian maid (Laura Vasiliu, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Cristian Mungiu
interview: Oleg Mutu
film profile
]
) of a wealthy couple (Sandra Ceccarelli, Aurélien Recoing), who is fired upon suspicions of having stolen a pair of pearl earrings.

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Everyone is searching for something in this film: balance, a decent life, love. And everyone must face reality.

Munzi – a "specialist" in integration after his short films and feature debut Saimir [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, which picked up an award at the Venice Film Festival – expands his horizons with this film shot in Turin. The humanity and depth of each character lie in ambiguity: no one is all good or all bad. Everyone is afraid.

The film has come to Cannes just as Italy is in the throes of discussing the "Romanian emergency" and the government is considering more severe and efficient measures against illegal immigration as well. Yet The Rest of the Night tackles the subject of fear of the other without indulgences, even risking exploitation.

"I was reluctant [to accept the role]," said Vasiliu, "because my character seemed immoral. But Francesco helped me see that the girl is lost in a world she doesn’t know and she doesn’t know what to do, and I suddenly found it much more interesting".

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(Translated from Italian)

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